HX 86 
.U9 
Copy 1 










Class VA *_ib_ 

Book V\(i— 

Copyright^ 

COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



WH AT' S SO AND 
WHAT ISN'T 



BY 
JOHN M. WORK 



THIRD EDITION, REVISED AND ENLARGED 



CHICAGO 

CHARLES H. KERR & COMPANY 

1906 



COPYRIGHT, 1905 
By JOHN M. WORK 

COPYRIGHT, 1906 
By JOHN M. WORK 



H 






LIBRARY of CONGRESS 
Two Copies Received 

OCT 22 1906 

(9 Copyright Entry 

CLASS A XXc.No. 

/ 5 V G G 
COPY B. 






CONTENTS 



Page. 

A Winning Movement 5 

The Stalest of the Stale 7 

Anarchy 11 

Communism 18 

Religion 24 

Paternalism 29 

Slavery ., 31 

Incentive 33 

Drunkenness 43 

Individuality — Dead Level 46 

Survival of the Fittest 49 

Woman, Home and Family 53 

Political Corruption 60 

Individual Initiative — I Want to Be My Own Boss 65 

The Farmer and His Little Farm 73 

Private Property 75 

Compensation for Risk 78 

Abstinence 80 

Materialists — Rainbow Chasers 82 

Impracticability 84 

Class Against Class 89 

Who Throws Away His Vote 91 

Making People Good by Law 93- 



IV CONTENTS 

Page. 

Competition — Struggle 95 

Mental Labor 101 

Book-keeping — Proportioning of Incomes 104 

Saving 106 

The Dirty Work 110 

Supply and Demand 1 12 

Always Have Been and Always Will Be 113 

Money 115 

Human Nature 117 

Confiscation 120 

Popular Management 125 

The Good Man Fallacy 127 

Patriotism 131 

The Race Problem 140 

A Big Undertaking 143 

The Constitution 145 

Inevitability of Socialism 149 

Forward 153 



WHAT'S SO AND WHAT ISN'T 



A WINNING MOVEMENT 

A friend of mine, while talking with an ac- 
quaintance one day, mentioned the fact that he 
was a Socialist; whereupon his acquaintance 
said: "A Socialist! Well, let's see; a Social- 
ist is one o' them fellers that believes that when 
a feller dies his soul goes into a cow or a dog, 
or something, ain't it?" 

Of course that misapprehension was due to 
lack of information on the subject of Socialism. 

All other objections to Socialism spring from 
the same source, so far as the average man is 
concerned. 

The capitalists and their satellites, however, 
know that these objections are lies. They re- 
peat them with the deliberate and malicious de- 
sire to injure the cause of Socialism. 

The capitalists and their satellites charge So- 
cialism with being guilty of every crime of 
which capitalism itself is in fact guilty, and 
which Socialism will prevent. 

But the average man is honest, or as nearly 
so as the capitalist system will permit him to 
be. He has heard or read these objections, 
and he believes them and repeats them simply 
because he is not informed on the subject. 

5 



6 what's so and what isn't 

Therefore, these objections must be met pa- 
tiently. 

We Socialists should remember that the av- 
erage man is badly overworked by capitalism 
when he has a job, that he is constantly on the 
verge of nervous prostration, that he is not 
in the proper mood and condition to prosecute 
extensive studies, and that he is deprived of the 
time, means and opportunity to do so anyway. 

We should also remember that there was a 
time w T hen we railed against Socialism our- 
selves. 

I plead guilty myself. 

In 1896 I investigated Socialism for the pur- 
pose of preparing a lecture against it. 

I wound up by preparing one in favor of it. 

I confessed my mistake. 

Don't be backward about confessing yours. 

Remember, always remember, that a wise 
man sometimes changes his mind. 

Socialism is the movement of the hour. It 
goes hand in hand with natural evolution. It 
has the marvelous advantage of being the truth. 
It is therefore a winning movement. 

I have answered the more frequent objec- 
tions that are raised against Socialism and 
questions that are asked about it. When these 
are cleared up in the mind of the investigator, 
all others will be dissolved by the rays of his 
enlightened understanding. 

The word "capitalism," ks used herein, means 
the present industrial system, wherein the 
mills, mines, factories, mercantile establish- 
ments, transportation lines, etc., are owned by 
private individuals and private corporations, 



THE STALEST OF THE STALE 7 

who hire men to do the work and pay them a 
fraction of the value of their labor. 

In closing these preliminary observations, I 
am going to let you into a little secret. It 
is this: I am beautifully innocent of literary 
style. I would not recognize literary style if 
I met it in the street. I half believe that you 
wouldn't either. That is the reason I con- 
sider it necessary to acquaint you with my own 
deficiency in that line. Not having any com- 
prehension of literary style, I have followed 
my own sweet will in writing this book. In 
presenting it to the public, with due acknow- 
ledgements to heredity and environment, I 
can only say with Shakespeare, "An ill-favored 
thing, sir, but mine own." 



THE STALEST OF THE STALE 

No, Socialism does not stand for dividing 

Capitalism stands far dividing up. 

I feel a good deal like apologizing for re- 
ferring to the absurd dividing up objection. 
But if you consider it an insult to your intel- 
ligence, remember that there are still many 
people who actually believe that Socialism 
stands for dividing up. 

Capitalism does stand for dividing up. 

Capitalism compels the industrious to divide 
up with the idle. 

Suppose you are the average wage worker. 

You work about nine hours a day. 



8 WHAT S SO AND WHAT ISN T 

In the first hour or two of your day's work 
you reproduce by your labor the amount you 
receive for the entire day. 

In another hour or two you reproduce your 
proportion of the wear and tear, the running 
expenses, the raw material, and the wages of 
superintendence. 

Well, then, having done this, it is time for 
you to take up your coat and hat and dinner 
pail and go home to your wife and babies. 

Do you do it ? 

No, you don't. 

What do you do? 

You go ahead and work the rest of the day 
and add still more to the world's wealth by 
your labor. 

Who earned that surplus? 

You earned it. 

Who gets it? 

The capitalist gets it. 

You divide up with him. 

The Socialist party says that you, who 
earned it, shall get it. 

The reason you do not get it now is be- 
cause a few private individuals and corpora- 
tions are permitted to own the means of pro- 
duction and distribution and to compel you to 
hand over to them the bulk of the product of 
your toil in exchange for an opportunity to earn 
a bare living. 

By voting a capitalist ticket, the republican 
or democratic ticket, you have extended to the 
capitalists the privilege of exploiting you out 
of the lion's share of your earnings. 

The Socialist party says that that portion 



THE STALEST OF THE STALE 9 

of the means of production and distribution 
which when privately owned can be used by 
the private owners to gouge other people, shall 
be publicly owned and popularly managed, that 
exploitation shall thereby be banished from 
the earth, and that the workers shall thereby 
secure the full product of their toil. 

So much for the wage earner. 

Now suppose you are the average farmer. 

A capitalist, individual or corporate, either 
owns the farm you live on or holds a mortgage 
against it. 

Out of your product you pay him rent or 
interest. 

You divide up with him. 

But that is not all. 

No matter whether you are a farmer with 
a farm free of encumbrance, a farmer with a 
mortgaged farm, or a farmer on a rented farm, 
you are compelled to hand over a slice of 
your product, in the form of profit, to each of 
the retail stores with which you trade. 

You divide up with them. 

You are also compelled to hand over a slice 
of your product to the elevator company. 

Another to the railroad company. 

Another to the commission merchant. 

Another to the board of trade speculators. 

Another to the beef trust. 

Another to the agricultural implement trust. 

Another to the binding twine trust. 

Another to the barbed wire trust. 

Another to the steel trust. 

Another to the lumber trust. 

Another to the rubber trust. 



10 what's so and what isn't 

Another to the hide and leather trust. . 

Another to the copper trust. 

Another to the brass trust. 

Another to the can trust. 

Another to the glass trust. 

Another to the paper trust. 

Another to the shoe trust. 

Another to the coal trust. 

Another to the oil trust. 

Another to the flour trust. 

Another to the woolen trust. 

Another to the cotton trust. 

Another to the sugar trust. 

And others to various other exploiters and 
grafters. 

You divide up with them. 

You have to. 

That is, you have to so long as capitalism 
exists. 

But you can abolish , capitalism by voting 
the Socialist ticket. 

No, Socialism does not stand for dividing up. 

Socialism is the public ownership and the 
popular management of the means of produc- 
tion and distribution which are now used to 
exploit the masses of the people out of the bulk 
of the product of their honest toil. 

Socialism will prevent dividing up. 

It will enable the men who produce the 
wealth to get it and enjoy it. 



ANARCHY 11 

ANARCHY 

No, Socialism is not anarchy. 

Capitalism is essentially anarchistic. 

The capitalists themselves are anarchists in 
their actions. Industrially, they are anarchists 
in their opinions also. Politically, they may 
or may not be. 

The capitalists are the most lawless citizens 
we have. 

Who corrupted the senate with sugar trust 
stock? 

The capitalists. 

Who fixes the congressmen? 

The capitalists. 

Who bribed the post-office officials to let 
fraudulent contracts? 

The capitalists. 

Who purchased the Massachusetts legisla- 
ture? 

The capitalists. 

Who purchased the Illinois legislature? 

The capitalists. 

Who purchased the Missouri legislature? 

The capitalists. 

Who purchased the Colorado legislature? 

The capitalists. 

Who bought the St. Louis aldermen? 

The capitalists. 

Who influenced the president to send troops 
to Chicago in violation of law? 

The capitalists. 

Who deported innocent working men from 
Colorado in violation of law? 

The capitalists. 



12 what's so and what isn't 

Who hires thugs to stir up riots during 
strikes? 

The capitalists. 

Who violates the railway safety appliance law ? 

The capitalists. 

Who gives illegal rebates? 

The capitalists. 

Who fixes the assessor? 

The capitalists. 

Who commits perjury to escape taxes? 

The capitalists. 

Who murders ten thousand people per year 
on the railroads of the United States by shoddy 
equipment and overwork of employes? 

The capitalists. 

Who murders and maims one hundred thou- 
sand people per year in the factories of the 
United States by lack of safeguards and over- 
work of employes? 

The capitalists. 

Who murders millions of people with adul- 
terated food and drugs? 

The capitalists. 

Who corrupts the legislators by presenting 
them with railroad passes? 

The capitalists. 

Who bribes the aldermen to grant fran- 
chises? 

The capitalists. 

Who puts up the money to buy votes for the 
republican and democratic parties? 

The capitalists. 

Who insists upon having the cities run wide 
open in order to stimulate business? 

The capitalists. 



ANARCHY 13 

Who violates the child labor law? 

The capitalists. 

Who are persistently and brazenly lawless? 

The capitalists. 

What is the essence of anarchy? 

Lawlessness. 

The capitalists are therefore anarchists in 
their actions. 

Industrially, they are anarchists, in their 
opinions also. That is to say, they believe in 
the present planless system, capitalism. They 
believe in letting everybody run amuck indus- 
trially. They believe in letting every man 
corner all of the means of production and dis- 
tribution he can, and keep all he can. They 
believe in shipping goods crisscross and helter- 
skelter over the country without any plan or 
system. They believe in the millionaire and 
the tramp. They believe in condemning the 
majority of the people to waste their time in 
useless work, because of the necessary duplica- 
tion of tasks occasioned by the planlessness of 
the system. 

The capitalist system is planless, chaotic and 
anarchistic. 

To call it a system is really a contradiction 
of terms. It is not a system. It is a lack of 
system. 

The capitalist believe in this lack of system. 

Industrially, they are therefore anarchists. 

Every person who does not believe in Social- 
ism is an industrial anarchist. He believes in 
the present anarchistic lack of system. 

Capitalism also drives men to political an- 
archy. 



14 what's so and what isnt 

Capitalism is the fruitful mother of exploi- 
tation, military oppression, injunctions, lockouts, 
poverty, child labor, starvation, prostitution, 
suicide, insanity, crime, graft, wretchedness, 
and a long retinue of other horrors. 

It is the knowledge and contemplation of 
this horrible fact that causes men to become 
political anarchists with their futile and short- 
sighted policy of killing rulers and leaders. 

Capitalism is the cause of the existence of 
anarchists. 

Remove capitalism, and presto! the anar- 
chists are gone. 

No, Socialism is not anarchy. 

One reason why it has been confused with 
anarchy is because the word Socialism used 
to be generic instead of specific. It used to 
mean about what the word radicalism does 
now. At that time it was therefore just as ap- 
propriate to call an anarchist a Socialist as it 
is now to call an anarchist a radical. But the 
word Socialism long since lost that meaning 
and took on its present meaning, which is the 
opposite of anarchy. 

But the chief reason why Socialism has been 
confused with anarchy is because the capital- 
ists and their satellites persistently lie about it. 
They persistently yoke the two words together 
in a desperate attempt to hold on to their ill- 
gotten gains by prejudicing the minds of the 
people against the great crusade for social jus- 
tice which is about to sweep their rickety sys- 
tem into oblivion. 

Socialism is the public ownership and the 
popular management of the means of produc- 



ANARCHY 15 

tion and distribution which are now used to 
exploit the masses of the people out of the 
bulk of the product of their honest toil. 

Anarchy means the total abolition of all laws, 
leaving the individual free to do as he pleases, 
both politically and industrially, unrestrained 
by law\ 

Socialism is therefore the opposite of anar- 
chy. 

Moreover, Socialism proposes to abolish 
the anarchy now existing. It proposes to bring 
order out of the present industrial chaos. 

But, is it not true that Socialism will bring 
about an environment which will cause men to 
become better and better morally until eventually 
there will not be any need of criminal laws? 

Yes. 

But that will not be anarchy. 

Not even philosophical anarchy. 

It will be an advanced stage of Socialism. 

It will be Socialism developed in its ideal 
beauty. 

After the laws against crime have fallen into 
disuse for lack of criminals, the laws regulat- 
ing industry will still exist and will be entirely 
necessary. 

If, in the evolution of the human race, So- 
cialism were a stepping stone to a more remote 
social system, that would not be the slightest 
argument against Socialism. 

But I do not share the view that Socialism 
is only a stage in economic evolution, and that 
there are other stages in that evolution to be 
reached later. 

I realize fully how careful one ought to be 



16 what's so and what isn't 

about declaring anything to be final. 

Nevertheless, there are some things which 
are final. 

For example, it is agreed by anthropologists 
that the human body has reached its final form. 
Of course it can be indefinitely improved, but, 
in all probability, the form will not be changed. 
On the contrary, the likelihood is that man's 
physical form will now remain stationary, that 
he has reached his goal so far as the form of 
his body is concerned, and that his further rev- 
olutions will be mental, moral and spiritual, 
instead of physical. By reaching his final 
physical form, his energies are released for 
mental, moral and spiritual changes. 

So with the economic evolution. 

Socialism will be its final form, and human 
energies, released from the economic struggle, 
will struggle along higher lines. 

Take another illustration. Suppose you have 
painted a square figure on a piece of canvas, 
and you want to gradually change it to a round 
figure. First, you change it to a pentagon, a fi- 
gure wth five sides. Then, you change it to a 
hexagon. Then, to a heptagon. Then, to an oc- 
tagon. Then, to a circle. 

Then you have to quit. 

Why? 

Because there isn't anything rounder than a 
circle. 

You can touch it up here and there. You 
can make the dark places bright, etc. But, you 
can't change its form any more, because there 
isn't anything rounder than a circle. 

So with the social system. 



ANARCHY 17 

We begin civilization with a system of chat- 
tel slavery, in which the many were exploited 
by the few who owned the earth. Then, we 
went through the stage of serfdom, the feudal 
system, in which, again, the many were ex- 
ploited by the few who owned the earth. Then, 
we emerged into the system out of which we 
are now about to pass, the capitalist or wage 
system, in which, again, the many are ex- 
ploited by the few who own the earth, or, more 
specifically, the industries. 

Now, Socialism will be a system in which 
the whole people will own the industries. 

Consequently, there is no other form beyond 
that. When you have taken in the whole peo- 
ple, you have reached the final economic form. 
It is just as impossible to conceive of any form 
more complete than that as it is to conceive 
of anything rounder than a circle. 

Of course, Socialism can be improved. You 
can touch it up, as you did the circle. If it 
has any dark spots, you can make them bright. 
But, that is only a matter of improving, not 
of changing the form. 

In course of time, you will be able to repeal 
all criminal laws, because men will have be- 
come so nearly perfect that they will no longer 
need them, and then you will have no laws 
left but those regulating industry. That is 
what those who dream of a form more remote 
than Socialism are really thinking of. But, 
that is not a different form at all. It is mere- 
ly Socialism carried to its logical conclusion, 
perfected in its ideal beauty. 

When Socialism is achieved, man will begin 



18 what's so and what isn't 

to give less and less attention to economic mat- 
ters, for the very good reason that they will 
have reached the final economic form. 

They will turn their attention more and more 
to those higher realms of thought, which will 
be open to them because they have reached 
the final economic form, the form in which 
all the people own the industries and partici- 
pate in the advantages, accruing from them, 
and therefore have the time, the means, the 
opportunity, and the disposition, to devote 
themselves to the higher realms of thought. 

The fact that Socialism is the final economic 
form will cause it to release human energy 
from bondage to economic questions, and con- 
fer upon the human race an unbounded free- 
dom to soar into the higher healms. 

This is the great glory of Socialism. 



COMMUNISM 



No, Socialism is not communism. 

Capitalism forces a disagreeable and very 
harmful species of communism upon large 
numbers of the people. 

Hundreds of thousands of families are hud- 
dled together in tenements in the cities. In 
New York over a hundred thousand people 
live in tenements of from five to seven stories 
in height. In certain portions the population 
is seventeen or eighteen thousand to the acre. 
Pure air is unknown. What air they do get 
is largely obtained through air shafts running 



COMMUNISM 19 

from the roof downward. These air shafts are 
frequently so arranged that they serve also 
as light shafts. They make it easy for families 
to see into each other's living rooms, destroy- 
ing the possibility of privacy even in sleeping 
and dressing. Few families have more than 
two rooms. Frequently a large family is 
crowded into one room. Indeed, there is fre- 
quently more than one family in one room. 
Under these circumstances morality becomes 
practically an impossibility. 

Other cities, in proportion to population, are 
also well supplied with these disgusting, dis- 
ease-breeding, crime-breeding bee hives of en- 
forced communism. 

These tenements are fatal to any intellectual, 
moral and spiritual expansion on the part of 
the men and women who are compelled to dwell 
in them. 

As for the children, they are doomed. They 
have no playground but the street. Over- 
crowding, bad air and excessive heat create 
a frightful mortality among them. These con- 
ditions kill them off like sheep in a slaughter 
house. Those who are so unfortunate as to 
escape death are foredoomed by their environ- 
ment to become criminals, tramps, imbeciles or 
lunatics. 

This is capitalist communism. 

But millions of people who live in detached 
houses are but little better off. Their houses 
are built so close together that they also are 
forced into a distressing and harmful species of 
communism. 

Capitalism congests the industries in large 



20 what's so and what isn't 

cities, to gain the advantage of railroad con- 
nections, shipping facilities, etc. 

The wage slaves have to follow them in 
order to get an opportunity to earn a living. 

Overcrowding is the natural result. 

The houses in which the workers live are 
built on lots which are from twenty to fifty feet 
wide. 

This deprives them of a large portion of their 
privacy. 

The children, as usual, are the most pitiable 
victims. 

It is next to impossible to prevent their being 
overwhelmed with undesirable companions, 
who ruin their morals, their dispositions and 
their manners. 

Some of the children of the neighborhood 
are all right. But others are vulgar. Others 
are lascivious. Others are gossipy. Others 
are envious. Others are stingy. Others are ill- 
tempered. Others are shallow. Others are 
giddy. Others are profane. Others are tuber- 
culous. Others are incompatible. 

A child ought to play with selected, invited 
companions, not with a neighborhood mob. 

A child ought likewise to have sufficient pri- 
vacy to learn to amuse himself and instruct 
himself, to secure the immense moral and spirit- 
ual gains that are to be had from solitude. 

But these rights are next to impossible of 
achievement under capitalist communism. 

For most families it is financially impossible 
even to have a board fence around the tiny 
lawn. 

The parents who secure these rights for 



COMMUNISM 21 

their children have to persistently fight for 
them. 

A few parents make a desperate fight agaihst 
having their children sacrificed. 

But most of them have given it up in despair. 

This is capitalist communism. 

Socialism will put an end to it. 

In the Socialist commonwealth there will be 
be no incentive to congest the industries in 
one place. The health, comfort and welfare 
of the people will be of first importance. The 
industries can be scattered out. The people 
will no longer have to huddle together. 

Moreover, when the people get all they earn, 
families can afford to have a few acres of lawn 
and trees around the houses, gaining for them- 
selves a wholesome privacy and an opportunity 
to feel the throb of nature's heart. 

No, Socialism is not communism. 

One reason why it has been confused with 
communism is because the history of language 
is again partly to blame. Half a century ago 
that which is now called Socialism was called 
communism. That is the reason Marx and 
Engels called their manifesto "The Communist 
Manifesto." If they had written it in recent 
years they would have called it "The Socialist 
Manifesto/' That which was then called com- 
munism changed its name to Socialism, and the 
word communism took on an entirely different 
meaning. Such changes of meaning are fre- 
quent as well as confusing. For example, to 
borrow an illustration, Thomas Jefferson was 
a member of the republican party. But the 
republican party afterward changed its name 



2% what's so and what isn't 

to democratic party and it had no connection 
whatever with the republican party which was 
born just before the civil war. In a similar 
manner, that which was once called communism 
changed its name to Socialism, while the word 
communism came to mean something altogether 
different. 

But the chief reason why Socialism has been 
confused with communism is because the capi- 
talists and their satellites persistently lie about 
it. They persistently charge that Socialism 
is communism. They actually point to com- 
munistic colonies and represent them to be 
samples of Socialism in actual operation. 

But they are samples of communism, not of 
Socialism. 

There are no real, bona fide samples of So- 
cialism in operation at the present time, simply 
because no nation has yet been socialized, al- 
though a good many of them are about to be. 
The nearest approach we have to a sample of 
Socialism in actual operation at the present 
time is to be found in the postoffice, the public 
schools and the publicly-owned water works, 
gas works, fire departments, etc. At the pres- 
ent time these publicly-owned institutions are 
administered in the interest of the capitalist 
class, which holds the political power. They 
are also stripped of safeguards from corruption. 
But, for all that, they are very successful from 
the standpoint of efficiency, and they are the 
nearest approach to samples of Socialism in 
actual operation that we have. 

Communism means the gathering of people 
together in colonies, owning in common not 



COMMUNISM 23 

only the means of production and distribution, 
but also private, personal, household effects. 
It means living in common. It means a com- 
mon dining hall, where everybody is expected 
to eat, whether or no. It means forced and 
unpleasant familiarity. It means the practical 
abolition of privacy. It means the substantial 
effacement of the individual. This makes it 
very disagreeable and distasteful, especially to 
a Socialist; for all Socialists have strong indi- 
viduality. 

Socialism is the public ownership and the 
popular management, not of private, persona? 
effects, but of those industries, those means of 
production and distribution, which are now 
used to exploit the masses of the people out of 
the bulk of the product of their honest toil. 

Socalism does not mean that the people are 
to live in common any more than your mail 
carriers, or your school teachers, or youv 
county officers — who work for the public — do 
now. 

Socialism does not mean that you will have 
to surrender your privacy. On the contrary* 
it means that you will have an opportunity to 
regain the privacy which you have already sur- 
rendered, as I have pointed out above. 

Socialism stands for the private ownership 
of everything that ought to be used in private. 
It stands for private property in everything 
except those things which can be used to ex- 
ploit others. It proposes to let you board at a 
hotel or a restaurant, or have your meals de- 
livered at the house, or cook for yourself, just 
as you please. It proposes to let you do what- 



24 what's so and what isn't 

ever you please with your income, except to 
exploit others with it. You can spend your 
money as you please, or save it if you want to, 
and leave your baubles to whomsoever you 
please when you die. 

Socialism proposes to promote fraternalism 
and good fellowship, not by a forced and vul- 
gar familiarity, but by removing the system 
which makes men necessarily enemies of each 
other. 

We fully appreciate the necessity of society 
to the development of the individual. 

We also fully appreciate the necessity of soli- 
tude to his development. 

We will give him abundant opportunity for 
both society and solitude. 



RELIGION 



No, Socialism is not antagonistic to religion. 

Capitalism is antagonistic to religion. 

Capitalism compels the masses of the peo- 
ple to scramble for a bare existence. It com- 
pels most of them to break the Golden Rule 
every day. It deprives them of the time to de- 
velop their spiritual natures. It deprives them of 
the frame of mind necessary to the development 
of their spiritual natures. 

That is amply sufficient to demonstrate that 
capitalism is antagonistic to religion. 

Of course religion and the church are two 
separate and distinct things. 

As for the church, with minor exceptions, 



RELIGION 25 

the capitalists dominate it and use it for their 
own purposes. They hold the purse strings of 
the church. The purse strings connect with 
the preacher's tongue. 

When the preacher's tongue gets unruly the 
capitalist gives the purse string a yank. 

The effect is electrical. 

The preacher becomes the most docile of 
men. He promises to be good. He promises 
that he won't do it again. 

But the preacher does not usually come to 
the pass of getting unruly. Heknows that it 
will not do. He knows that if he tells the 
truth about the capitalists and the capitalist 
system from his pulpit he will be likely to lose 
his job. So he shuts his eyes to the horrors of 
capitalism. He praises the iniquitous system. 
He grovels before wealth. He abhors work- 
ingmen who strike against starvation wages. 
He loses no opportunity to prejudice his hear- 
ers in favor of capitalist slavery. 

He has to do this or run an imminent risk 
of losing his job. 

He is not a leader. He is a mirror. He re- 
flects the views of his wealthy parishioners. If 
he fails to reflect accurately, they smash the 
mirror. 

He is in a precarious and pitiable position. 
He does not know how to do anything but 
preach. If he were to tell the truth and lose 
his job he knows of no other occupation in 
the world to which, he could turn with a fair 
prospect of being able to make a living. He 
would not only face disgrace, in the eyes of 
his capitalist friends, but he would face actual 



26 what's so and what isn't 

starvation. He has a wife and children. He 
loves them. He does not want them so suffer. 
By being a hypocrite he can provide them with 
material and educational advantages. It is a 
trying position. 

Of course, the right thing for him to do is 
to throw hypocrisy to the winds, face the situ- 
ation with indomitable courage and resolve 
that he will do and say what he believes to be 
right, utterly regardless of the effect which it 
may have on himself. He ought to be brave 
enough to prefer to die in the gutter rather than 
be a hypocrite. 

Some of them have faced the situation and 
many of these have lost their jobs. 

But these are only the rare spirits. 

Such sublime courage is scarcely to be ex- 
pected of the common herd of preachers. The 
average preacher trims his sails to the breeze. 
He guards his utterances so as to say nothing 
that will offend the men who pay the bills. 
He makes an unconditional surrender to the 
capitalist class. 

This is superabundant demonstration that 
capitalism is antagonistic to religion. It throt- 
tles religion and uses religious institutions for 
its own purposes. It uses the pulpit to attempt 
to perpetuate itself. 

No, Socialism is not antagonistic to religion. 

Directly, Socialism has nothing to do with 
religion. 

Indirectly, Socialism will have a benignly 
beneficial effect upon religion. 

The republican party is made up of Chris- 
tians, infidels, agnostics, atheists, Christian 



RELIGION 27 

Scientists, Theosophists, Spiritualists and ev- 
ery other phase of religious thought. 

The same is true of the democratic party. 

And the same is true of the Socialist party. 

Ours is a political and economic, not a religious 
movement. 

Directly we have nothing to do with reli- 
gion. It would be just as absurd for us to take 
a stand on religious questions as it would be 
for the republican or democratic party to do so. 

To be sure, when a priest or a preacher at- 
tacks us we are not slow to expose him. 

We show how he is gagged with half-fare 
railroad tickets. 

We show how he has prostrated himself be- 
fore the capitalist class. 

We pare away his conventional excrescences 
and lay bare his rotten heart to the public gaze. 

But that is not an attack upon religion. 

It is only self defense against the savage 
thrust of a mercenary hypocrite. 

Directly, Socialism has nothing to do with 
religion. 

It is true, however, that incidentally, Social- 
ism will emancipate religion. It will give the 
masses of the people the time and the means 
and the opportunity to develop themselves, 
physically, mentally, morally and spiritually. 
It will make it unnecessary for them to violate 
the Golden Rule. It will make it easy for them 
to do right and hard for them to do wrong. It 
will give them a mental attitude favorable to 
the development of their spiritual natures. 

Capitalism and its predecessors have pre- 
vented the development of spirituality. The en- 



28 what's so and what isn't 

vironment has been unfavorable to its develop- 
ment. Socialism will provide an environment 
that will be favorable to its development. 

Men are in their spiritual infancy at the pres- 
ent time. They have scarcely begun to de- 
velop. When Socialism provides a favorable 
environment it is not improbable that spiritual 
development may attain its manhood and come 
upon the stage as the star in the tragi-comedy 
of human life. 

Capitalism is a drama in which the villain, 
mammon, is the star. 

Socialism will also incidentally emancipate 
the church from slavery to capitalism. A 
clique of men will no longer monopolize the 
means of life. Furthermore, Socialism will 
guarantee every citizen an opportunity to earn 
a living. The preacher will be able at any time 
to step out of the church into another remuner- 
ative occupation if he so desires. The fact that 
he is in a position to do this will make him in- 
dependent. He will not take dictation from 
anybody. He will preach the truth as he sees 
it. He will rise from his present prostrate 
position and stand erect. 

It is true that Socialism will also incidentally 
weed out false religious doctrines. It will do this 
merely because it will provide universal educa- 
tion and enlightenment. A universally en- 
lightened people will be able to discern which 
doctrines are true and which are false. 

But that is something which every sincere 
religionist will welcome. 

Every honest man wants the truth to prevail. 

A man who is afraid that the universal en- 



PATERNALISM 29 

lightenment brought about by Socialism will 
injure his religion is simply aware that his 
religion will not bear investigation. In other 
words, he knows that his religion is false. He 
is a hypocrite. 

Socialism will provide fruitful soil for any re- 
ligion that will bear investigation. 

It will be fatal to any religion that will not 
bear investigation. 

Naturally every sincere religionist feels en- 
tirely positive that his religion will bear inves- 
tigation. 

Therefore, no sincere believer in any religion 
can for a single moment consider Socialism 
dangerous to his religion. 

Religion is a private matter. 

Socialism stands for complete religious lib- 
erty. 



PATERNALISM 



No, Socialism is not paternalism. 

Capitalism is paternalism. 

We have had paternalism for many centuries 
and we have it now. 

Paternalism is the rule of the few. It is a 
man or a clique of men governing the people. 

Under absolute monarchy, one man did the 
governing. After the lords compelled the king 
to divide up his authority with them, the king 
and the nobility did the governing. When the 
common people secured the right to vote, it 
was thought that this would put an end to pa- 
ternalism. 



30 what's so and what isn't 

It did put an end to political paternalism. 

We now get what the majority votes for. 

But we still have industrial paternalism, a 
paternalism of the most cruel and unjust char- 
acter. 

A few men own the industries of the coun- 
try. 

They have the masses under their control. 

They can starve them to death, or freeze 
them to death, or work them to death. 

They can and do dictate for the most part 
when they shall work, where they shall work, 
and what incomes they shall receive. 

That is paternalism gone to seed. 

So long as it continues, emancipation from 
political paternalism is useless except as a means 
of accomplishing emancipation from this indus- 
trial paternalism. 

By voting the Socialist ticket industrial pa- 
ternalism can be abolished. 

No, Socialism is not paternalism. 

Socialism will complete and perfect political 
emancipation by introducing equal political 
rights for men and women, by introducing the 
initiative and referendum, proportional repre- 
sentation, the recall, and home rule, by abol- 
ishing the veto power on the part of executives, 
by abolishing the usurped power on the part 
of the courts to nullify the will of the people 
by declaring laws unconstitutional, and by 
making the national and state constitutions 
amendable at any time by majority vote, so as 
to do away with what has been called "the 
tyranny of the dead/' 

Socialism will acomplish industrial emanci- 
pation by abolishing industrial paternalism and 



SLAVERY 31 

introducing industrial fraternalism ; in other 
words, by abolishing private monopoly and in- 
troducing public ownership and the popular 
management of the industries now used to ex- 
ploit the people out of the bulk of the product 
of their honest toil. 

In the Socialist commonwealth the people en- 
gaged in any industry will elect the managers, 
foremen, superintendents, etc., in that industry. 

That is the rule of the many instead of the 
few. 

When the few cease to rule and the many 
begin to rule, paternalism will breathe its last, 
and fraternalism will take its place. 

When these changes are brought about by 
Socialism we will have both a political and an 
industrial government of, for and by the peo- 
ple. These changes will enable the people to 
govern themselves, both politically and indus- 
trially, for the first time since civilization be- 
gan. 

And when the people govern themselves, 
both politically and industrially, paternalism 
will cease and fraternalism will begin. 



SLAVERY 



No, Socialism is not slavery. 

Capitalism is slavery. 

In order to demonstrate that capitalism is 
slavery, all that is necessary is to repeat a por- 
tion of what I said in the chapter on Paternal- 
ism. 



32 what's so and what isn't 

A few men own the industries of the coun- 
try. They have the masses under their control. 
They can starve them to death, or freeze them 
to death, or work them to death. They can 
and do dictate for the most part when they 
shall work, where they shall work, and what 
incomes they shall receive. 

That is slavery gone to seed. 

Socialism will abolish that slavery. 

Socialism is freedom. 

Socialism will give every worker an equal 
voice in the management of industry. It will 
give him the greatest industrial liberty that it 
is possible for him to have under any imagin- 
able industrial system. As men are very differ- 
ent in their makeup and their tastes, it will be 
able to give them the kind of work they pre- 
fer, in the locality they prefer. It will also 
afford mobility, so that a man can move about 
from place to place if that is his desire. It 
will give him the full value of his labor, which 
will be enough to afford him not only all ma- 
terial comforts, but also all the higher things 
of life. It will give him short hours of labor, 
so that he will have the time and the disposi- 
tion to avail himself of the higher things of 
life. 

In short, it will give him industrial freedom 
in place of the present industrial slavery. 

In order to repeat myself as little as possible, 
I will refer the reader for further matter bear- 
ing upon this subject to the chapter on Indi- 
viduality — Dead Level, and the chapter on In- 
dividual Initiative — I Want to Be My Own 
Boss. 



INCENTIVE 33 



INCENTIVE 



No, Socialism will not destroy incentive to do 
one's best. 

Capitalism destroys incentive to do one's 
best. 

Socialism will destroy incentive to do one's 
worst. For example, it will destroy the incen- 
tive to kill off the people by food adulteration. 
It will destroy incentive to overreach one's fel- 
low men, and to pinch and cramp and brutalize 
them by the myriad means now in use. 

I am not going to give you a heart ache and 
a stomach ache by describing the things which 
you are compelled to eat day by day and which 
cause the death of thousands of people and the 
ill health of many thousands more, but I want 
to say that you can pass pure food laws until 
you are blind and you will still continue to 
eat adulterated food just as long as the food 
factories are in control of private parties who 
have every incentive to adulterate the food in 
order to make money out of it. It is to the 
interest of the manufacturers to bribe the in- 
spectors. And, even if they did not bribe them, 
it is a sheer impossibility to have an inspector 
on hand at every stage of the process. When 
the adulteration is not made at the stage where 
the inspector is geting in his work, it can be 
made at some other stage. There are dozens 
of opportunities to adulterate, in spite of the 
most rigid inspection, before the product reach- 
es the consumer. 

The groceries you buy are adulterated. 

The drugs you buy are adulterated. 



34 what's so and what isn't 

The meat you buy is tainted. 

The clothes you buy are shoddy. 

The shoes you buy are a swindle. 

The furniture you buy is poorly constructed. 

The house you rent is cheaply built, cold and 
unhealthy. It was built to rent, not to live in. 

Almost everything you buy is fraudulent. 

You will use adulteration, taint and shoddy 
until capitalism is abolished and Socialism is 
introduced. And the hearse will continue to 
drive up and take away the bodies of the vic- 
tims of food and drug adulteration, until that 
time. 

When the public owns the packing houses, 
there will be no incentive to can tuberculous 
steers, nor to sell filth for food. There will be 
every incentive to make pure food and to keep 
the factories in a cleanly, healthful condition. 

But I promised not to give you a stomach 
ache. 

Let me take a prosaic illustration of the ef- 
fects of the vicious incentives to which capi- 
talism gives full swing. I have in mind a 
house which was spouted with the best tin on 
the market. In four years the tin was rotten 
and the job had to be done over again. An 
expert tinner testifies that there is no good 
tin made in the United States. You can't buy 
it at any price. Of course the manufacturers 
claim that all the tin they make is good. Never- 
theless, good tin can not be bought at any 
price. They don't make it. 

Why? 

Because it pays better to make poor tin and 
charge the same price for it that they could 



INCENTIVE 35 

get for good tin. Capitalism provides them 
with a full fledged incentive to make the worst 
tin they can work off on the people. 

The spouting on the houses built by our 
fathers and grand-fathers lasted all the way 
from twenty-five to a hundred years. I know 
of one house that was spouted in 1847, and to 
all appearances the spouting is still just as 
good as new. It will probably last another 
half century. But that tin was made in the 
old days before fierce competition drove men 
to degrade the quality. 

It is the same with practically everything 
else on the market. I have only used tin as an il- 
lustration. Practically everything has been 
cheapened in quality. It is almost impossible 
to buy a good grade of anything. 

A traveling man who sells maple syrup is 
authority for the statement that there is no 
pure maple syrup on the market. He says 
that most of the alleged maple syrup is alto- 
gether spurious. There is simply no maple 
syrup in it at all. And when the real stuff is 
sold, it is sold in an adulterated form. He says 
that he has many a time seen spurious maple 
syrup made in Minnesota where they have a 
pure food law. They make it out of the pith 
of corn cobs and — but I must keep my promise. 

The only good pianos are those which were 
made a long time ago. They don't make any 
good ones now. 

It is an impossibility to buy good butter. 
There isn't any on the market. This is some- 
thing we all know by painful experience. But, 
there I go again. 



36 what's so and what isn't 

Groceries, drugs, clothing, furniture, almost 
everything that the common people have to 
buy, are so degraded in quality that you can't 
get a good article for love or money. 

All this is due to capitalism with its base 
incentives. It was not so before capitalism be- 
gan to approach its acute stage, because it was 
not necessary at that time for the people to do 
such things in order to make a living. But 
when labor saving machinery began to throw 
millions of men out of employment, and all the 
trades and professions as a result became over- 
crowded with people jostling each other in a 
mad scramble for a bare existence, it became 
necessary for men to use every hook and crook 
in order to eke out a subsistence. They be- 
gan to adulterate, to deteriorate, to degrade, 
everything they made or sold. They did it be- 
cause there was money in it. They are con- 
tinuing to do it because there is money in it. 
And they will continue to do it as long as there 
is money in it. Even in the cases where indus- 
tries have passed into the hands of trusts — and 
most of the industries are now trustified — the 
adulteration and shoddy continue. It might 
be thought that they would cease such prac- 
tices because they are wealthy and therefore 
not forced to it by absolute necessity. But, 
now that the trick has been learned, and their 
consciences hardened, they keep it up, and they 
will continue to keep it up as long as they own 
the industries. 

Socialism will remove every incentive to 
make adulterated and shoddy goods. It will 
not be to anybody's financial interest to com- 



INCENTIVE 37 

mit these outrages. They will therefore cease. 

How silly to expect them to cease so long 
as the industries are owned by private parties 
who can fill their pockets with money that 
way! 

How utterly foolish to expect to remove 
this evil by appealing to men's honesty! Or 
by setting other men to watch them ! 

Take away the power, the necessity, and the 
incentive, and the evil will disappear. 

Capitalism provides abundant incentive to 
graft, to shirk, to drink, to gamble, to debauch, 
to commit crime, to violate the Golden Rule, 
and to perpetuate all the villainous frauds and 
deceptions which surround us on every hand. 

Socialism will destroy the bad incentives. 

It will keep the good incentives and increase 
them. 

Under capitalism the best incentives are im- 
possible of universal application, although 
some of them do crowd to the surface in spite 
of the discouraging environment. 

Since the concentration of capital has prog- 
ressed to an acute stage, so that it requires 
enormous capital to conduct a successful busi- 
ness, the average man is condemned by inex- 
orable conditions to work for a small income 
so long as the present system lasts. 

What is his incentive? 

Is it the prospect of a liberal income beckon- 
ing to him from in front? 

No, for he has no such prospect under this 
system. 

On the contrary, his incentive is the fear of 
starvation prodding him in the rear. 



38 what's so and what isn't 

Truly, a despicable incentive. 

No great thought or act ever proceeded from 
incentive so base. 

The incentive of the wealthy few is even 
more base, the incentive to accumulate im- 
mense fortunes. 

When that low and mean incentive once 
possesses a man's mind, he is lost to higher 
impulses so long as it controls him. 

In the Socialist commonwealth, the average 
man will receive several times as large an in- 
come as he now receives. 

So far as the hope of financial reward can 
operate as an incentive, he will therefore have 
several times as great an incentive to work 
well and faithfully as he has now. 

He will be released from the fear of starva- 
tion. He will have the incentive to work well 
and faithfully because by so doing he can se- 
cure all the necessaries, comforts and higher 
privileges of life. 

At the same time he will not to any great 
degree be degraded by the base incentive to 
accumulate money, for no man can accumulate 
much money when he receives nothing but 
what he is entitled to. Money is accumulated 
by investment, manipulation, speculation, and 
all sorts of varieties of grafts, and these will be 
impossible in the Socialist commonwealth. 

The field will therefore be cleared for higher 
incentives. 

Under feudalism, the prevailing incentive 
among the many was to escape starvation, and 
the prevailing incentive among the few was 
to excel in war. The making of money was 



INCENTIVE 39 

considered beneath the dignity of a gentleman. 

Under capitalism, the prevailing incentive 
among the many is to escape starvation, and 
the prevailing incentive among the few is to 
excel in making money. The incentive to make 
money is at least better than the incentive to 
carve the most people with a sword. 

Socialism will be another and infinitely great- 
er advance in the matter of incentives. 

The desire to excel will continue to be a 
powerful incentive. 

But it will be the desire to excel in some- 
thing better than killing people or accumulat- 
ing wealth. 

It will be the desire to excel in doing some- 
thing useful. 

Under capitalism, the man who excels can 
only do so by trampling his fellow men under 
his feet. 

In the Socialist commonwealth, the man who 
excels can only do so by benefiting his fellow 
men with his superior knowledge or skill. 

Socialism will also open wide the door of 
incentive in invention, in the sciences, and in 
the fine arts. 

Today the inventor scarcely ever receives 
any substantial reward for the work of his 
genius. Capital is necessary to develop an in- 
vention. So he sells it to a capitalist for a 
song. The capitalist receives the reward of the 
inventor's genius. 

In the Socialist commonwealth the inventor 
will not have to struggle with incessant pov- 
erty, but will be able to give free rein to his 
genius. 



40 

Socialism may therefore expect an era of 
marvelous inventions, such as will make the 
miraculous inventions of the last hundred years 
appear trifling in comparison. 

Those who are attracted toward scientific 
pursuits will have ample time and opportunity 
to do their best along those lines. 

Today the devotee of the fine arts has to 
please the rich in order to keep out of the poor- 
house. The masses of the people are so steeped 
in poverty and hard work that their taste for 
art is as undeveloped as their material ability 
to gratify such taste if they had it. The few 
people who have artistic taste lack the means 
to gratify it. 

The rich are almost uniformly vulgar. 

They love ostentatious display. 

They love a work of art for the money it 
cost, not for its artistic beauty. 

It is to their lack of taste that the artist must 
truckle. No wonder artistic genius is rare. 
The moment when a mercenary motive creeps 
into an artist's brain, genius spreads her wings 
and flies away. 

No beautiful thing, no great thing, was ever 
done primarily for money. 

Socialism will give the masses an abundant 
opportunity to develop artistic taste, and artis- 
tic genius, too, for that matter. The artist will 
then have a constituency worthy of the highest 
genius. He will no longer be dependent upon 
the vulgar rich. 

On the whole, however, the tendency of So- 
cialism will be to make man's highest incentive 
the desire to do good in the world. 



INCENTIVE 41 

The fact is, that while the prevailing incen- 
tives at the present time are the incentive to 
escape starvation and the incentive to excel in 
making money, these are by no means the only 
incentives now existing. 

Says John Ruskin : "It is physically impos- 
sible for a well-educated, intelligent, or brave 
man to make money the chief object of his 
thoughts; as physically impossible as it is for 
him to make his dinner the principal object of 
them." 

What is the incentive of the young man who 
1 works like a Trojan on the football or baseball 
field, without any pecuniary compensation for 
it? 

It is partly love of the sport and partly de- 
sire to excel in the game. 

What is the incentive of the man who aban- 
dons a paying business to run for an office, 
when he could make far more money by at- 
tending to business? 

It is honor, fame, public approbation. 

The fact is that behind the incentive to make 
money there is frequently the incentive of love of 
approbation. The money is wanted in order to i 
gratify the love of approbation. The money is 
wanted in order to secure approbation. If appro- 
bation can be secured in other ways the money 
will not be wanted. 

Socialism will put men on their merits and 
give them all a fair chance to secure approba- 
tion in better ways than making money or 
spending money. 

What is the incentive of the man who works 
all his life to support his wife and children? 



42 what's so and what isn't 

Do they pay him money for doing it? 

No, his incentive is love. 

Among thousands of men and women the 
love of family has expanded into love of the 
whole human race. They do not love their 
families any less than before. In fact, they 
love them more. But they also love their fel- 
low men more. Their highest incentive is to 
be of service to humanity. Socialism will pro- 
vide conditions wherein that incentive will 
become the highest incentive of a constantly 
increasing number of people, until, in course 
of time, it will take in the entire human race. 

Socialism will enable every boy and girl to 
grow up in a normal condition. 

That means that people will enjoy superb 
health and buoyant spirits. 

They will no longer be flabby imitations of 
men, like the flimsy, careworn, overworked 
hollow-chested specimens of humanity we see 
on the streets today. 

They will no longer be born tired. 

They will have an overmastering desire to 
exercise themselves. 

They will take pleasure in expending their 
superabundant vitality. 

It has been well said that they will enjoy 
working and achieving as much as the spirited 
colt enjoys prancing around the pasture. 

Socialism will therefore extend to all the 
people an incentive which now operates only on 
a few — the joy of effort, the ecstacy of achiev- 

To a large extent this incentive will become 
operative as soon as Socialism is introduced. 



DRUNKENNESS 43 

But it will become more and more operative 
as the favorable conditions make the people 
more and more healthy of body, vigorous of 
mind and wholesome of morals. 

Meantime, Socialism will provide a varied 
multitude of lesser incentives, including the in- 
centive to secure several times as large on in- 
come as the average man is getting now. 



DRUNKENNESS 



No, Socialism will not increase drunkenness. 

Capitalism increases drunkenness. 

Socialism will abolish drunkenness. 

It will be for the majority of the people to 
say whether any liquor shall be manufactured 
and sold or not. 

If it is manufactured and sold, it will be 
manufactured and sold by the public, not by 
private parties. 

Why are the liquor dealers such a power in 
politics today? 

Why do they push their business with such 
strenuousness, regardless of the wreck it may 
bring to some unfortunate individuals? 

The answer is easy — there is profit to be 
made by selling liquor. 

Socialism will remove that profit. 

Like everything else, liquor, if sold at all, 
will be sold at cost. The man who handles 
it will have no personal interest in trying to 
get people to buy. Neither will it be to his 
interest to sell in violation of the regulations. 



44 what's so and what isn't 

The public sells the liquor now in South Caro- 
lina and in many parts of Alabama. It has 
not been a fair test, of course. They sell at a 
profit. It is a sample of public capitalism, not 
of Socialism. But, in spite of that, and in spite 
of the fact that the prime causes of intemper- 
ance still remain, drunkenness has been reduced 
and the evils of the privately owned saloon 
largely eliminated. No drinking is allowed on 
the premises where the liquor is sold. This abol- 
ishes treating at one stroke, and treating is one 
of the worst features of the liquor evil. 

But Socialism will do more than that. 

Socialism will cut the root of the liquor^evil. 

Socialism will provide conditions wherein 
men will not be driven to drink, as they are 
now. 

There is no inherent moral quality in liquor. 

It is not the use of liquor, but the abuse of 
it, that is harmful. It is the intemperate use 
of liquor that is harmful. Capitalism is the 
cause of the intemperate use of liquor. 

Poverty, with its disheartening lack of hope 
and its dreary outlook for the future, is driv- 
ing hundreds of thousands of men into intem- 
perance. 

Business, with its fierce competition, its un- 
remitting toil, its ceaseless grind, its racking 
worry and its mentally and morally stunting 
superficially, is driving hundreds of thousands 
more to drink. 

Frances E. Willard, after a lifetime spent in 
the temperance movement, said at the conven- 
tion of the World's W. C. T. U. at London, 
in 1895 : "Twenty-one years of study and ob- 



DRUNKENNESS 45 

servation have convinced me that poverty is a 
prime cause of intemperance." Speaking of 
Socialism she said : "Oh, that I were young 
again, and it would have my life !" 

Overwork in the excessive heat of a foundry 
causes the worker to crave liquor. 

Overwork in a monotonous occupation 
causes the worker to crave liquor. 

Overwork in an ill-ventilated place causes 
the worker to crave liquor. 

Overwork even in a good environment causes 
the worker to crave liquor. 

Nine-tenths of the people fall under one or 
the other of the above heads. 

Nine-tenths of the people are driven to crave 
some sort of stimulant because they are physi- 
cally incapable of meeting the constant, ex- 
hausting drain upon their vitality without stim- 
ulant. 

Socialism will remove poverty and all its 
hideous train of limitations. 

Socialism will remove the long hours. 

Socialism will remove the unhealthy sur- 
roundings. 

Socialism will remove the fierce struggle for 
a bare animal existence. 

Socialism will remove the lack of hope. 

Socialism will remove the racking worry. 

Socialism will remove the mental and moral 
starvation. 

Socialism will remove the physical discom- 
fort. 

Socialism will remove the overwork. 

Socialism will remove all the causes which 
predispose men to the abuse of liquor. 



46 what's so and what isn't 

The causes of intemperance being thus re- 
moved, intemperance may therefore be expect- 
ed to disappear. 

The prohibitionists are whacking away at 
the outside of a cancer. They attack the ef- 
fects only. Their efforts are therefore entirely 
futile. 

Socialism will remove the cause. Socialism 
will purify the blood. The cancer will there- 
fore vanish. 



INDIVIDUALITY— DEAD LEVEL 

No, Socialism will not destroy individuality 
and reduce the people to a dead level. 

Capitalism has destroyed individuality and 
reduced the people to a dead level. 

Capitalism has reduced the masses of the 
people to the dead level of poverty. 

It has reduced them to the dead level of long 
hours of labor. 

It has reduced them to the dead level of ina- 
bility to avail themselves of the higher things 
of life. 

Socialism will release them from that dead 
level. 

Socialism will give the whole human race 
abundant access to the higher things of life. 

All Socialists are intense individualists, as 
you will discover if you mingle with them. 

I am an individualist. 

I want an opportunity to develop my indi-. 
viduality. 



INDIVIDUAL — DEAD LEVEL 47 

I know that Socialism will give me the time 
and the means and the opportunity to develop 
my individuality. 

And I also know that Socialism will give 
to every other man, woman and child the time 
and the means and the opportunity to develop 
his or her individuality. 

Capitalism stifles individuality. 

Socialism will develop it. 

Capitalism reduces men to the dead level of 
equal ignorance, flatness, dullness and uninter- 
estingness. 

Socialism will develop varied and scintillat- 
ing individuality and originality that will make 
it a keen pleasure to mingle with men. 

Socialism means a fair deal for everybody. 

Socialism means that all men shall have an 
equal opportunity to develop themselves. Each 
will naturally develop himself in acordance 
with his special bent. And all will acquire 
wide culture and enlightenment. But their 
special development will make them far more 
varied and unlike than they are now. They 
are very much at the same stage of lack of de- 
velopment now. They are on a dead level of 
lack of development. 

Capitalism, by forcing men to spend their entire 
lives in earning a bare existence, prevents the 
development of their individuality. 

Their individuality is slumbering. 

Socialism will awaken it. 

There was a time when a certain measure of 
individuality was a common possession in 
America, when men had practically equal 
chances in the world, and when the highest 



48 what's so and what isn't 

success then attainable was open to all. 

When wealth was somewhat evenly distri- 
buted, when the tools of production were sim- 
ple, and the domain of idle land was ample, 
all men had approximately equal chances to 
achieve success in any line of endeavor. 

But since that time all has changed. 

The wealth of the nation has concentrated 
into the hands of a few. 

We have developed into a nation of masters 
and slaves. 

The masses of the people live a hand-to- 
mouth existence. 

They no longer have even financial individual 
initiative. 

And on account of their poverty and their 
long hours of labor, they are prevented from 
developing individuality along higher lines as 
well. Their financial condition is such that it 
is impossible for them to reach out into the 
higher realms of investigation, of culture, and 
of thought, where the highest individuality and 
originality may be cultivated and displayed. 

Socialism will give everybody the financial 
power to command the highest opportunities 
for self-improvement. Socialism will take the 
children out of the factories, stores and mines, 
and put them in school, where they can lay 
a foundation on which to build individuality 
and originality. 

Socialism will also cut down the hours re- 
quired to provide the necessaries and comforts 
of life to such an extent that even the adult 
citizen will have more than half his time to 
avail himself of the higher things of life. 



SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST 49 

Every man has some incipient individuality 
and originality. 

Socialism will remove the barriers and let it 
grow. 

Socialism will throw wide open the doors of 
ambition and high achievement. 

Socialism will make every man stand on his 
merits instead of his money. 

It will be a glorious thing to live in the So- 
cialist commonwealth. 

Socialism will give men greater individuality 
than has ever yet existed in this world. 

The old, stark anarchistic, hostile, tyranni- 
cal individuality which capitalism promotes is 
simply enmity toward one's fellow men. 

Socialism will develop the true individuality. 

The true individuality is the wide culture 
and special development of the individual, not 
in opposition to, but in harmony with, the 
equal rights of others. 

This individuality is as much higher in qual- 
ity than the old capitalistic individuality as the 
zenith is higher than the equator. 



SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST 

No, Socialism will not prevent the survival 
of the fittest. 

Capitalism prevents the survival of the best. 

Socialism will abolish the survival of the 
slickest. 

Socialism will provide conditions wherein 
the best will have a chance to survive. The 



50 what's so and what isn't 

best are now killed off, or submerged. 

There never has been a time since the dawn 
of civilization when the best men have sur- 
vived. That is, when the best men have been 
accorded their proper place among their fellow 
men. 

The best men are the men of moral integ- 
rity, of intellectual vigor, the broad-minded and 
big-hearted men, the men who do something 
useful, the men who love their fellow men, the 
men who try to do good in the world, the men 
who are of the best use to humanity. 

These are the best men. 

But the conditions since civilization began 
have not been such that they could survive. 

The fittest do survive. 

That is, the men who are fittest for the en- 
vironment. The men who are the nearest 
adapted to existing conditions. 

Throw wheat in a weed patch and the weeds 
will survive, although the wheat is the best. 

The weeds are the fittest for those condi- 
tions. 

Pit a man naked-handed against a hyena, and 
the hyena will survive, although the man is 
the best. 

The hyena is the fittest for those conditions. 

In the middle ages the man who was the 
most expert with the sword and the lance was 
the one who survived, although no one will 
contend that he was the best. 

He was the fittest for the conditions of a 
social system in which might ruled and physi- 
cal prowess was the deciding factor. 

At the present time, the narrow-minded men, 



SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST 51 

the men who have turned their hearts to stone, 
who have blocked up the avenues of pity and 
sympathy, who never have an unselfish 
thought, who never do anything useful, who 
deny themselves all the expanding culture and 
ennobling associations of life, who spend every 
minute of their waking hours in a selfish, bru- 
tal, fiendish, savage, cruel, merciless, ghoulish 
conflict for financial supremacy, are the men 
who survive, although no intelligent man will 
contend for a moment that they are the best 
men. 

They are the fittest for the conditions of a 
social system in which the possession of money 
and property is considered success, and in 
which it is necessary for one to lay aside his 
higher qualities and make use of the inferior 
qualities of cunning and craftiness in order to 
achieve that so-called success. 

In the Socialist commonwealth the men who 
are the most useful to the human race, in the 
trades, in the professions, in the management 
of affairs, in the arts, in the sciences, in litera- 
ture, in everything that is good, will survive. 

They will survive because they will be the 
fittest for the conditions of a social system in 
which it will be necessary to use the best and 
noblest qualities of human nature in order to 
succeed. 

They will be the fittest and also the best. 

For the first time since the dawn of civiliza- 
tion the best will survive. 

Today the men- who survive are not only not 
the best men, but they can survive only by 
bringing wreck and ruin upon their fellow men, 



52 what's so and what isn't 

destroying their hopes and brightening their 
lives. 

In the Socialist commonwealth the men who 
survive can only survive by making the lot of 
their fellows happier and better. 

They can only elevate themselves by ele- 
vating all humanity. 

Years ago a reckless young adventurer went 
to California. He found a rich gold mine. 
Although the gold did not belong to him, the 
law allowed him to take it because he happened 
to find it. He became worth more than a hun- 
dred million dollars. He invested this money 
in such a manner that it constantly brought 
into his purse still other money that did not 
belong to him, and which was sorely needed 
by those to whom it did belong. The news- 
papers called him successful and said he was a 
great commercial genius. When he died he 
was lauded to the skies. You would have 
thought he was a great man, instead of a mere 
lucky adventurer. His name was John W. 
Mackey. 

Once upon a time a boy was born who 
seemed to possess a perfect passion for music. 
When a mere child he exhibited musical talent 
which astonished his friends and put older mu- 
sicians to shame. He was afflicted with ex- 
treme poverty. He struggled manfully and de- 
voted his whole soul to his passion. The result 
was a series of musical productions which have 
ever since held the musical world entranced. He 
struggled on in poverty. His whole life was 
embittered and filled with suffering by his pov- 
erty. At the age of thirty-five he died — of 



WOMAN, HOME AND FAMILY 53 



starvation. His body buried in a pauper's 
grave. His name was Mozart 

Mozart was one of the best men. 

But John W. Mackey was one of the fittest 
for the existing conditions. 

Therefore, Mackey survived. 

In the Socialist commonwealth the best will 
also be the fittest. 



WOMAN, HOME AND FAMILY 

No, Socialism is not against the home. 

Capitalism is against the home. 

Socialism does not attack the family. 

Capitalism attacks the family. 

Socialism does not stand for free love. 

Capitalism stands for free love. 

Those who charge that the Socialists believe 
in free love simply lie. The Socialists are eter- 
nally advocating the things they believe in. 
If they believed in free love they would be 
eternally advocating it. The fact that they 
say they do not believe in it is proof positive 
that they are opposed to it. 

Capitalism does stand for free love. 

In the city of New York alone there are fifty 
thousand prostitutes.' And the other cities and 
towns in the land have them in about the same 
proportion. Of course it is obvious that there 
must be more loose men than loose women, for 
otherwise the loose women could not make a 
living. There are a few girls who seem to be 
born bad and whose environment is such that 



54 WHAT S SO AND WHAT ISN T 

they cannot overcome the influence of heredity. 
But the vast majority of the girls who become 
prostitutes are forced into it by circumstances. 
Tenement houses, seasons of unemployment, 
long hours of labor, monotony of life — all these 
are breeders of prostitution. And all these are 
due to capitalism. Furthermore, the industries 
in this country are paying such miserable 
wages to their female employes that for many 
of them it is impossible on so small a sum to 
pay for board and lodging and keep their per- 
sonal appearance up to the standard which 
their employers require and which their own 
impulses dictate. 

When a girl finds that her paltr}^ three or 
four dollars a week will not pay her living ex- 
penses, and a man offers to replenish her purse 
on the usual condition, she is not deliberately 
a fallen woman. 

She is the helpless victim of a vicious and 
heartless social system. 

Socialism will throw its protecting shield 
around her and it will say to the pimps and se- 
ducers, "Hands off, and give the American 
girl an opportunity to develop into pure and 
noble womanhood!" 

Free love is promiscuity. The number of 
prostitutes is constantly increasing. It is all 
due to capitalism. 

If that is not a system of free love, what is it? 

Socialism will give every working woman her 
full earnings, it will give every working woman 
short hours of labor, it will wipe out the 
wretched tenements, and it will give every wo- 



WOMAN, HOME AND FAMILY 55 

man who desires to work an opportunity to 
do so. 

When that is done, the brothel will cease 
to receive recruits. Even many of its then oc- 
cupants will welcome the opportunity to get 
back into respectable life. 

Thus Socialism will remove one of the worst 
menaces to the home and family. 

But the home and family have still other ene- 
mies under capitalism. 

In the factories of the United States a million 
married women are w r orking. They are work- 
ing there because the wages their husbands 
receive are not sufficient to support their fami- 
lies. In many cases the husband is not able to 
find a job at all, but does the housework in- 
stead. 

If these women had short hours of labor, if 
their tasks were suited to their strength, and 
they had no household duties in addition, this 
would not be an interference with family life. 

But when a wife and mother has to work at 
hard labor in a factory from eight to fourteen 
hours a day, no family life worthy of the name 
can exist in her home. 1 

It is practically an abolition of home and 
family. 

It is altogether due to capitalism. 

And Socialism will entirely cure that evil. 

Another menace to the home and family un- 
der capitalism is the fact that there are vast 
numbers of children working in the mills, 
stores and mines, many of whom ought to be 
in the kindergarten and all of whom ought to 
be in school. Their labor is necessary under 



56 what's so and what isn't 

present conditions to the support of the fami- 
lies to which they belong. 

The tale of their sufferings is a harowing 
one. 

Of all the villainies due to capitalism the 
blighting of the lives of little children is the 
most fiendish. 

It makes one's blood boil to think of it. 

Socialism will put an end to it. 

Socialism will take the children out of the 
mills, mines, stores and factories and put them 
in school. 

What sort of decent home and family life 
can there be where the litle ones have to be 
sold into this infamous slavery? 

Another menace to the home and family un- 
der capitalism is the fact that immense num- 
bers of our young men dare not marry, on ac- 
count of the uncertainty of being able to earn 
a living. 

The last census shows that there are over 
seven million unmarried men in the United 
States. A normal man does not remain unmar- 
ried of his own free will. 

This condition of things puts a premium on 
prostitution. 

It is altogether due to capitalism. 

Socialism will make it financially easy for 
every man to earn a living. 

Another menace to the home and family un- 
der capitalism is the economic dependence of 
woman. Woman is the slave of man because 
man supports her. 

I lay it down as an indisputable proposition * 
that no woman can have genuine self-respect 



WOMAN, HOME AND FAMILY 57 

unless she earns her own living. 

It is so difficult for a woman to make an hon- 
est living for herself today that, although it 
is not a very polite thing to say, it is nevertheless 
a fact that there is a constant competition 
among women to win the marriageable men 
for husbands. 

A woman is practically forced by conditions 
to marry the first man she has a chance to 
marry, whether she loves him or not, because 
she may never have another opportunity. Mar- 
riage without love is better than a brothel, at 
least in the eyes of the public. Of course, there 
are some women who marry for money when 
they are not forced to do so. The daughters 
of the capitalists are in the habit of marrying 
for money because it brings them social posi- 
tion. There are also some men who marry 
for money. They as a rule are not forced to do 
so, but merely do it because they are thrifty. 

But the woman who marries for a home is 
forced to do so by economic necessity. 

This fact is the cause of untold domestic un- 
happiness. 

It is the cause of most of the divorces. 

There is probably more sheer nonsense writ- 
ten about the divorce evil than any other evil 
of the day. 

Short-sighted persons are unable to see that 
divorces are due to misfit marriages and that 
misfit marriages are due to capitalism. 

Short-sighted persons want to deny divorces 
except for adultery. But when married peo- 
ple do not love each other it is prostitution 
for them to live together. It is legalized pros- 



58 what's so and what isn't 

titution, to be sure, but it is prostitution just 
the same. The fact that it is legal does not 
make it any less leprous morally. These short- 
sighted persons want to compel these married 
couples to live together in prostitution. 

Short-sighted persons also say that while di- 
vorce may be necessary, the divorced persons 
should not be permitted to' marry again. The 
sexual passion is next to the appetite for food 
and drink in its strength. It is perfectly natu- 
ral. Its normal and temperate gratification is 
necessary to the highest physical, mental, moral 
and spiritual development of the individual in 
the human form. Furthermore, it will find 
gratification in spite of all barriers, legally if 
possible, illegally if necessary. To forbid the 
remarriage of divorced persons is simply to 
drive them into illicit relations. That is what 
these shortsighted persons would do. 

So long as there are matrimonial misfits there 
should be divorces, with as little publicity and 
humiliation as possible, and the divorced per- 
sons should be permitted to remarry as freely 
as anyone else. 

The moral welfare of society demands this. 

But Socialism will practically abolish divorce. 
It w r ill do it, not by denying divorces, but by 
creating conditions wherein matrimonial mis- 
fits will be few and far between. When a man 
and woman marry for love alone, and are not 
pinched, narrowed and irritated afterward by 
poverty, by primitive industry carried on in 
the home, and by the relation of master and 
slave toward each other, the chances are that 



WOMAN, HOME AND FAMILY 59 

they will live happily together all their lives 
and never think of wanting a divorce. 

Socialism will give woman the power to earn 
a good living for herself. 

Then she will be a position to marry for love 
alone. 

She is now an economic slave. 

She will then be economically free. 

Of course Socialism stands for equal suffrage. 
But it stands for infinitelv more than that. It 
not only stands for the complete political 
emancipation of woman, but it also stands for 
the complete economic emancipation of woman. 

Another menace to the home and family un- 
der capitalism is the fact that both the husband 
and the wife are constantly overworked. 

For the husband, this makes the home too 
often a mere place to eat and sleep. 

For the wife, it makes the home a prison 
where she is doomed to perpetual slavery and 
drudgery. 

"Beyond the altar lies the washtub." 

A bright young woman who could easily 
perform all the labor that ought to be required 
of anyone, without injury to mind or body, 
leaving her ample time for higher development 
and for civic duties, becomes a household 
drudge, warping her mind, deforming her body, 
and bringing the wrinkles of old age prema- 
turely to her face. Frequently she not only 
does the family washing, but has to wash for 
well-to-do families while her husband walks 
the streets in search of a job. She has to bend 
over a cooking stove day in and day out, year 
in and year out. Litttle wonder if she be- 



GO " what's so and what isn't 

comes irritable and narrow-minded. What else 
could you expect under such circumstances? 
It is a marvel that she does not become nar- 
rower than she really does. 

This condition of things is wholly due to capi- 
talism. 

Socialism will remedy that evil. 

Another menace to the home and family un- 
der capitalism is the poverty of the masses of 
the people, which compels them to skimp them- 
selves constantly and do without practically 
all of the ennobling and refining things of life 
which would make the home a real home in- 
stead of a pitiful caricature of a home. 

This poverty is due entirely to capitalism. 

Socialism will remove that evil. 

In short, capitalism is the arch enemy of the 
home and family. 

Capitalism is making home a farce and a 
travesty. 

Capitalism is making family life impossible 
for millions of the people and a wretched fail- 
ure for most of the rest. 

Socialism will remove all of these menaces 
to the home and family. 

We can therefore confidently expect Social- 
ism to result in a wonderful elevation and puri- 
fication of the home and family. 



POLITICAL CORRUPTION 

No, Socialism will not increase political cor- 
ruption. 

Capitalism increases political corruption. 



POLITICAL CORRUPTION CI 

Some people who have never thoughtfully 
considered the subject say that the public own- 
ership and operation of the industries, with the 
consequent increase in public officials and pub- 
lic business, will lead to an increase in political 
corruption. And they say we have enough 
now. 

Indeed, it is true that we have enough now. 

We have entirely too much. 

Socialism proposes to abolish political cor- 
ruption. 

How? 

By abolishing its cause. 

What is its cause? 

The private ownership of the industries. 

In other words, capitalism is the cause of 
political corruption. 

Capitalism is also the cause of private cor- 
ruption, the cheating, lying, stealing, adulter- 
ating, grafting, etc., now going on in private 
business. 

If Socialism merely transferred the corrup- 
tion now going on in private business to the 
public business the total sum of corruption 
would not be increased. We would be as well 
off in that respect as we are now. 

But we do not intend to do that. 

We intend to abolish political corruption. 

What is it that causes a legislator to take a 
bribe? 

The private business interests of those who 
bribe him. It is to their financial interest to 
bribe him. 

Socialism will make those business interests 
public. It will thus remove the incentive to 



62 what's so and what isn't 

bribe him. Nobody could gain anything by 
doing so. 

Who is it that corrupts the aldermen of the 
cities and towns? 

The corporations which own the water 
works, the street railways, the gas works, the 
electric light plants, the telephone systems, the 
fire hose manufactories, the brick plants, the 
asphalt plants, and other industries which sup- 
ply cities with the things they need. 

Socialism will publicly own and operate all 
of those enterprises. The cause of that corrup- 
tion will thus be removed. 

What is it that causes a candidate for con- 
gress to spend more money getting elected than 
the salary of a congressman amounts to, cor- 
rupting the voters with liquor and buying them 
outright when possible? 

It is because the great capitalists of the 
country, the owners of the big industries, in re- 
turn for his favors to the capitalist class in 
congress, are only too glad to give him tips 
as to when and where to speculate and invest 
so as to make many times the amount of his 
salary. Sometimes they bribe him outright. 
But that is scarcely necessary. They can eas- 
ily reward him by showing him how he can 
draw a fortune out of the pockets of the toil- 
ing dupes who elected him to congress. 

Socialism will make the industries public 
property. There will be no incentive to buy 
congressmen. The congressional aspirant will 
no longer want the office badly enough to try 
to corrupt the voters in order to get it. 

Why is it that the capitalist political parties, 



POLITICAL CORRUPTION 63 

the republican and democratic machines, 
shamelessly disgrace our election days by the 
use of liquor and money at the polls? 

Because there are great corporations and 
trusts which are willing to pay these machines 
vast sums of money, called campaign funds, 
for their services in letting the capitalist class 
alone or passing such legislation as it desires. 

Socialism will make those corporations and 
trusts public property and thereby remove the 
cause of this corruption. 

What was the cause of the scandal in the 
postoffice department at Washington? 

Private ownership of the industries. In 
other words, capitalism. 

What were the corruptionists in the post- 
office department charged with? 

They were charged with taking bribes from 
private corporations in consideration of using 
their influence to get the postoffice department 
to let contracts to those private corporations 
for the manufacture of various articles used 
in the postoffice department. 

If the public had owned those plants and 
manufactured those articles itself, instead of 
letting contracts to private corporations for 
them, there would not have been any oppor- 
tunity for that corruption to occur. ^ 

That is perfectly plain. 

That corruption was due to the private own- 
ership of the plants which produced those ar- 
ticles. 

Yes, but, if the public did own those manu- 
facturing plants it would still have to buy, from 
other private corporations, material of various 



64 WHATS SO AND WHAT ISN'T 

kinds for use in those plants, and thus the door 
would be opened to corruption again in the 
letting of contracts to those other private cor- 
porations. 

True. 

And the remedy for that is the public owner- 
ship and operation of those other industries. 

The remedy for the evils of public ownership 
is more public ownership. 

Extend the circle of public ownership to the 
point where all the industries are made public, 
so that there are no longer any contracts to be 
let to private plants, and you have completely 
shut out the opportunity for such corruption. 

Socialism will also introduce the initiative 
and referendum, so that city councils, legisla- 
tures and congresses will not have the power to 
pass important laws without submitting them 
to popular vote. Likewise the recall, which 
will enable the people to discharge any official 
at any time when they distrust him, instead 
of letting him fill out his term as they have to 
do at present. 

Socialism will also make all men so vitally and 
personally interested in public affairs that the 
good men will keep the rascals out of the im- 
portant positions. Hundreds of thousands of 
"good" men now attend to their private affairs, 
without giving a thought to public affairs. This 
gives designing men an advantage in public af- 
fairs. In the Socialist commonwealth the af- 
fairs of these "good" men will be public af- 
fairs. They will be compelled by the nature 
of things to give attention to public affairs. 

In view of all these altered circumstances, it is 



INDIVIDUAL INITIATIVE 65 

safe to say that Socialism will immediately 
upon its introduction practically abolish politi- 
cal corruption. 

And in the course of a few years, as soon 
as the new environment has had time to elim- 
inate by degrees the grafting propensity which 
has been so highly developed by capitalism, 
Socialism will abolish political corruption alto- 
gether. 

Graft is a product of the present environ- 
ment. 

Socialism will provide an environment in 
which graft cannot live. It will wither away and 
die. 



INDIVIDUAL INITIATIVE— I WANT TO BE MY 
OWN BOSS 

No, Socialism will not destroy individual ini- 
tiative. 

Capitalism has destroyed individual initia- 
tive. 

You want to be your own boss. 

You are not your own boss now. 

Up to the middle of the nineteenth century, 
and even later, individual initiative was open 
to the people in general in this country to a 
large degree. 

But it is no longer open to them. 

And yet, the man who howls that he wants 
to be his own boss has not yet awakened to the 
fact that times have changed. 

He does not realize that there has been an 



66 what's so and what isn't 

industrial revolution and that the masses of 
the people are now living in a condition of in- 
dustrial slavery. 

He imagines that conditions are just the 
same as they were when he was young. 

He imagines that a young man, or a man 
of any age, has the same opportunities to get 
on in the world that he had when he was 
young. 

He forgets that when he was young the land 
was free. In order to get a farm all a man had 
to do was to go out and take it. And it did 
not require a lot of expensive machinery to till 
it, either. He had to brave the dangers of the 
frontier, of course, but, if he was willing to do 
that, the land was free as air. 

He forgets that when he was young the de- 
mand for men in all avenues of industry was 
so great that it could not be supplied. 

He forgets that today every trade and every 
profession is not only overcrowded, but liter- 
ally jammed. 

He forgets that when he was young the 
wealth of the country was distributed some- 
what equitably, and that business and industry 
were carried on for the most part by individ- 
uals working on their own hook. 

He forgets that at that time hand work was 
the chief method of carrying on industry. 

He forgets that since that time wealth has 
for the most part concentrated into the hands 
of a few ; that varied and marvelous machinery 
has been introduced, and that it now requires 
a great fortune to engage in business in such a 
manner as to be able to compete 



INDIVIDUAL INITIATIVE 67 

He forgets that business is now carried on 
for the most part by great aggregations of 
wealth, against which a man with only a limi- 
ted amount of money has no show at all. 

He forgets that this industrial revolution has 
been brought about by the change from simple 
hand tools to great labor saving machines 
which make associated effort necessary and 
inevitable. 

He forgets that the small businesses are at 
best only making a bare living for those en- 
gaged in them, and that a great many of them 
are not even making that, but, on the contrary, 
are going to the wall. 

He forgets that during the past thirty or 
forty years the great business establishments 
have crowded millions of small business men 
out of business and into the ranks of the wage 
laborers. 

If he will take the trouble to open his eyes 
and look about him he will discover that the 
fact that a few men have acquired possession 
of the means of production and distribution 
dooms the masses of the people to continue 
to serve those few just as long as the capitalist 
system lasts. 

The day when a man could be his own boss 
industrially, in the old sense of the term, has 
forever passed away. 

The labor saving machine compels associa- 
ted effort. 

Capitalism makes this fact harmful. 

Socialism will make it beneficial. 

The workingman, so far as industrial mat- 
ters are concerned, is governed absolutely by 



68 what's so and what isn't 

the master class. He is not his own boss. 

Even a trust magnate has to be governed 
largely by the will of other trust magnates. He 
is not his own boss. 

The small merchant, the small manufacturer 
and the farmer are the abject slaves of the big 
capitalists. They are not their own bosses. 

Even leaving the big capitalist out of consid- 
eration, the small business man, from whom we 
hear this objection the most frequently, is not 
his own boss. 

In all cities and towns of considerable size 
the grocer is governed largely by the will oi 
the retail grocers' association. He is not his 
own boss. 

The butcher is governed largely by the will 
of the retail butchers' association. He is not 
his own boss. 

The saloon keeper is governed largely by the 
will of the retail liquor dealers' association. 
He is not his own boss. 

The job printer is governed largely by the 
will of the employing printers' association. He 
is not his own boss. 

The building contractor is governed largely 
by the will of the builders' association. He is 
not his own boss. 

The clothing merchant is governed largely 
by the will of the retail clothiers' association. 
He is not his own boss. 

The hardware merchant is governed largely 
by the w T ill of the retail hardware merchants' 
association. He is not his own boss. . 

The druggist is governed largely by the will 



INDIVIDUAL INITIATIVE 69 

of the retail druggists' association. He is not 
his own boss. 

The plumber is governed largely by the will 
of the plumbers' association. He is not his 
own boss. 

And so on. 

But that is a very small and insignificant 
part of the story. 

The small business man is the abject slave 
of the trusts that control his line of business. 

If they permit him to make a living at all, 
it is only a bare living. If he gets "funny" 
they crowd him out of business. Frequently, 
they crowd him out of business when he does- 
n't get "funny" at all, simply because he is 
superfluous, because they don't need him. 

How do they crowd him out? 

Easy. 

By declining to grant him dealers' discounts. 
In other words, by refusing to sell goods to 
him at wholesale prices. Of course, he can 
not make anything by buying them at retail 
prices. So he. goes out of business. He is not 
his own boss. 

Even if he is permitted to stay in business 
he is not his own boss, for the wholesalers or 
manufacturers can withdraw the dealers' dis- 
counts from him at any time they see fit. If 
they do so, he goes to the wall. He is at their 
mercy. He is not his own boss. 

Manufacturers frequently find it to their finan- 
cal advantage to put in retail stocks of goods 
in various places in charge of hired man- 
agers. Such managers are not their own 
bosses. 



70 what's so and what isn't 

Branch department stores, in charge of hired 
managers, have made their appearance in many- 
towns. Such managers are not their own 
bosses. 

There are in the United States thousands of 
liquor saloons which are owned by the big 
brewing companies and are in charge of hired 
managers. Such managers are not their own 
bosses. 

Another favorite method on the part of the 
big manufacturers is to put in a stock on con- 
signment to a small merchant. The public 
probably thinks the merchant owns the stock. 
But as a matter of fact the manufacturer owns 
it. The merchant merely pays the rent and the 
insurance, does the business and gets a com- 
mission on whatever he sells. He is absolute- 
ly dependent upon the will and whim of the 
manufacturer. He is not his own boss. 

Even those merchants who own their own 
stocks are nearly all heavily in debt, either to 
the banks, or the wholesalers, or both. They 
are dependent upon the will and whim of their 
creditors, who can close them out so quick 
that they won't know what hurt them. They 
are not their own bosses. 

To sum up. 

The workingman cannot work without the 
consent of a capitalist. He cannot work with- 
out letting a capitalist confiscate the larger 
portion of his earnings. That is slavery, not 
liberty. The workingman is not his own boss. 

The farmer cannot till the soil without let- 
ting the capitalists gouge him out of most of 



INDIVIDUAL INITIATIVE 71 

the product of his toil. That is slavery, not 
liberty. The farmer is not his own boss. 

The small business man cannot go into busi- 
ness or stay in it without the consent of the 
big capitalists. That is slavery, not liberty. 
The small business man is not his own boss. 

The yearner for industrial individual initia- 
tive will have to reconcile himself to the fact 
that the time has forever gone by when a man 
could, in an industrial sense, be his own boss. 

The labor saving machine compels associa- 
ted effort. 

The day of associated industrial effort is 
here. 

The man who objects to it merely kicks 
against the pricks. 

He will have his bruises for his pains. 

If he does not clear the track he will be run 
over. 

The wheels of progress cannot be turned 
back. 

He may as well overhaul himself one time 
as another, tear himself loose from reactionary 
conservatism, and dump the senseless preju- 
dices out of his mind. 

The world has discarded industrial individ- 
ual initiative in the old sense. Henceforth we 
will get along without it. 

But Socialism will remove the evils that 
have come with this change. At the present 
time a few men dominate the whole industrial 
situation. The rest of us are their slaves. 

Socialism will give us all an equal voice in 
industrial matters. 

That will be far better than the old style of 



72 what's so and what isn't 

individual initiative where we fought the whole 
world single handed and came pretty near 
starving to death at it. 

But Socialism will give everyone individual 
initiative in a new sense of the term. 

There is the most unbounded range for indi- 
vidual initiative in public affairs. 

We can illustrate with a school teacher. The 
school teacher works for the public. She does 
not own the school and run it on her own 
hook. She is not her own boss in the old 
sense. She has to be guided in general terms 
by the collective will. Has she lost her indi- 
viduality and her power of individual initia- 
tive? Not she. She has lost most of the graft 
propensity. But she has retained all of her 
individuality and improved upon it. She is 
always trying to improve herself. She is al- 
ways trying to discover better methods of ac- 
complishing results. Her heart and soul are in 
her work. She finds daily use for all of her 
powers of individual initiative in doing her 
portion of the collective work. 

So in all occupations in the Socialist com- 
monwealth. Each one will in doing his por- 
tion of the collective work need to bring his 
powers of individual initiative into use. 

But industry will really become a minor af- 
fair in the Socialist commonwealth. It will be 
attended to first because the material wants 
must be provided for first. 

But the great glory of Socialism is that it 
will emancipate the people from eternal slav- 
ery to the securing of mere food, clothing and 
shelter. 



THE FARMER AND HIS LITTLE FARM 73 

Socialism will enable the people to employ 
the larger portion of their time in higher pur- 
suits. 

In these higher pursuits individuual initia- 
tive will have full swing. 

And the people will be amazed when they 
remember that they once prized the old capi- 
talistic individual initiative. 



THE FARMER AND HIS LITTLE FARM 

No, Socialism does not propose to deprive 
the farmer of his little farm. 

Capitalism is depriving the farmer of his lit- 
tle farm. 

On a certain occasion when I was billed to 
speak at a country school house in Kansas 
the following conversation took place between 
two farmers living in the vicinity : 

"Are you going to the Socialist meeting to- 
night ?' 

"No, I guess not." 

"Oh, you better go and throw in your little 
eighty !" 

It is capitalism that makes the farmer throw 
in his little eighty. 

The land is slipping out of his grasp. 

In 1880, twenty-five per cent of the farmers 
of America w T ere renters. 

In 1890, twenty-eight per cent of them were 
renters. 

In 1900, thirty-five per cent of them were rent- 
ers. 



74 what's so and what isn't 

Who is depriving the farmer of his little 
farm ? 

But that is not all. 

Mortgages are eating up a large percentage 
of the farmers who are not renters. 

A mortgaged farmer is but little better off 
than a. renter. About the only difference is 
that he pays interest instead of rent. 

Capitalism is gradually and surely squeezing 
the land out of the farmer's grasp. 

But if he should have a little land left by 
the time the Socialist comonwealth is intro- 
duced, Socialism will not deprive him of it. 
Not if he wants to use it himself. Since the 
primary object of Socialism is to stop robbery 
and secure to the useful workers of the world 
the full value of their labor, it is only necessary 
to the carrying out of that object that we 
should have the public ownership of those 
things which when privately owned can be 
used by the private owners to rob other peo- 
ple. A farmer operating his own farm does 
not rob anyone else. 

Socialism will not force him into the public 
farming. Socialism will depend entirely upon 
its own superior profitableness and attrac- 
tiveness to draw him in. 

It may be that at ordinary kinds of farming 
a given number of farmers working together 
with gigantic machinery can produce more 
than the same number of farmers each work- 
ing separately on his private farm can produce. 

If so, public farming will be more profitable. 
It will also be more sociable, more pleasant, and 
will afford a great deal more leisure and oppor- 



PRIVATE PROPERTY 75 

Utility for travel, culture and mental development. 

In that case the small farmer will go into it 
because it will be to his interest to do so. 

Nevertheless, if he should feel that he would 
prefer to stay on his small farm he will be at 
perfect liberty to do so. And, although he 
may not be as well off there as he would be at 
public farming, yet he will at least be vastly 
better off than he is now, because Socialism 
will mean the public ownership of the trusts 
which now pluck him of the bulk of his pro- 
duct. He will be able to secure the full value 
of his product. So, no matter whether he feels 
that he wants to enter into public farming or 
stay on his private farm, it is in either case to 
his interest to vote for Socialism. 



PRIVATE PROPERTY 

No, Socialism will not prevent the people 
from owning private property. 

Capitalism prevents the people from owning 
private property. 

Capitalism confiscates the bulk of the pro- 
duct of the wage worker. This makes it im- 
possible for the average wage worker to own 
his own home. It makes it impossible for 
him to own anything but the cheapest house- 
hold furniture. He has the cheapest carpets 
on his floors. He has the cheapest curtains 
on his windows. He has the cheapest cloth- 
ing for his family. He has the cheapest food 
for his table. He is not able to afford books 



76 what's so and what isn't 

and pictures and statuary. If he manages to 
buy a piano on monthly payments, it is a 
cheap, tinny, bangy affair that degenerates 
rather than cultivates the musical faculty. 

All of his property put together would not 
invoice more than a hundred or two of dollars. 

In fact, it is not fit for junk. 

Capitalism prevents him from possessing 
private property. 

In the cities and towns of the United States 
there are 10,488,000 homes — or alleged homes. 

Of these, 6,351,000 are occupied by renters. 

Of the remainder, 1,101,000 are mortgaged. 

Of the entire 10,488,000 homes, less than 
one-third are owned by their occupants free 
of encumbrance. 

The number of renters is constantly increas- 
ing. 

The percentage of mortgages is also con- 
stantly increasing. 

See the second volume of the census of 1900. 

In the cities of 100,000 and over, in the Uni- 
ted States, seventy-two per cent of the popu- 
lation lives in rented houses. 

In San Francisco, seventy-six out of every 
hundred families live in rented houses. Eight 
out of every hundred live in houses to which 
they hold the title, but which are mortgaged. Six- 
teen live in houses which they own free of en- 
cumbrance. 

In New Orleans, seventy-eight out of every 
hundred families live in rented houses. Three 
live in houses to which they hold the title, but 
which are mortgaged. Nineteen live in houses 
which they own free of encumbrance. 



PRIVATE PROPERTY 77 

In Chicago, seventy-five out of every hun- 
dred families live in rented houses. Thirteen 
live in houses to which they hold the title, 
but which are mortgaged. Twelve live in 
houses which they own free of encumbrance. 

In New York, eighty-eight out of every hun- 
dred families live in rented houses. Seven live 
in houses to which they hold the title, but 
which are mortgaged. A meager five live in 
houses which they own free of encumbrance. 

It is needless to say that these overwhelm- 
ing majorities of homeless are the families of 
the working class. 

I have already shown how T the farmers are 
being stripped of their property. 

Capitalism prevents those who produce 
property from owning property. 

Socialism will give everybody a chance to 
own private property. 

Not the kind of private property that can be 
used to gouge other people, however. 

But I do not mean that Socialism will for- 
bid any man owning and running any indus- 
try he pleases. Socialism will own and run 
industries itself. It will give the workers the 
full value of their product. It will sell the 
products at cost. Anyone else engaging in the 
same industries would, therefore, have to give 
the workers the full value of their product and 
sell the products at cost. But he couldn't 
make aything that way. Consequently he 
wouldn't do it. If the industry were of such 
a character that he could carry it on by his 
own labor alone he could do so. But he would 
not be exploiting anyone else then. 



78 what's so and what isn't 

"But," I hear Mr. Capitalist's whining voice 
complaining, "will there be no way in which I can 
invest my money so that I can draw an income 
from it without working myself?" 

No, you will positively have to quit stealing. 

Socialism will enable everyone to own a 
comfortable and healthful home, substantial, 
beautiful and attractive furnishings for his 
home, and all of the things which are neces- 
sary for expanding culture and a wholesome, 
healthful life. 

In other words, Socialism will enable every- 
one to own all the private property he needs 
for his own use. 

Luxury and poverty are both evil. 

Socialism furnishes the desirable middle 
ground between these two extremes, the gold- 
en mean, the happy medium, the condition 
wherein there will be luxury and poverty for 
none, but plenty for all, and the amplest op- 
portunity for physical, mental, moral and spir- 
itual development. 



COMPENSATION FOR RISK 

But, if a man invests his money in the means 
of production and distribution, is he not en- 
titled to a profit on his investment on account 
of risking his money? 

No, he is not. 

Why? 

Because he has no right to have money in- 
vested in the means of production and distri- 
bution. 



COMPENSATION FOR RISK 79 

Of course, if a man merely owns such por- 
tion of the means of production and distribu- 
tion as he can use himself, nobody is wronged. 

But, for a private individual or corporation 
to have money invested in the means of pro- 
duction and distribution, thus drawing an in- 
come from other men's toil, is wrong. 

It is wrong for the same reasons that it is 
wrong to own a chattel slave. 

If you own a chattel slave you appropriate 
to yourself the product of the slave's labor. 

So, also, if you invest money in the means 
of production and distribution, you appro- 
priate to yourself the product of the working- 
men's labor. 

But, although that is amply sufficient to 
make it wrong, still that is not all. 

The people positively have to use the means 
of production and distribution in order to live. 

If you have money invested in the means of 
production and distribution, you own the peo- 
ple's means of subsistence. 

To own their means of subsistence is iden- 
tically the same thing morally as owning them. 

The principle involved is identically the 
same as the principle involved in chattel slav- 
ery. 

Having money invested in the means of pro- 
duction and distribution is, therefore, wrong 
for the same reasons that it is wrong to own 
a chattel slave. 

A man not only has no right to a return 
on money invested, but he has no right to have 
money invested. 



80 what's so and what isn't 

Of course, some men have to do so under the 
present system. 

The present system compels men to do 
wrong. 

Socialism will enable them to do right. 



ABSTINENCE 



No, the capitalists did not get rich by their 
abstinence. 

They got rich by the abstinence of the work- 
ers. 

The apologists for capitalism make the ab- 
surd claim that the reason the capitalists have 
accumulated money is because they have ab- 
stained from buying things, while the poor 
have squandered their money. 

But the truth is that the poor are the peo- 
ple who have abstained. 

The workers have abstained from living in 
decent houses. 

They have abstained from the use of mod- 
ern conveniences. 

They have abstained from wearing decent 
clothing. 

They have abstained from eating choice 
foods. 

They have abstained from buying books. 

They have abstained from sending their 
children to the colleges and universities. 

They have abstained from availing them- 
selves of the broadening influences of travel. 



ABSTINENCE 81 

They have abstained from practically every- 
thing that conduces to wide culture, and phys- 
ical, mental, moral and spiritual growth. 

In other words, they have abstained from 
practically everything that distinguishes men 
from beasts and makes life worth living. 

In the meantime, the capitalists have lived 
in luxury. 

They have lived in splendid mansions with 
acres of lawn, instead of tenements or hovels 
on twenty-five or fifty foot lots. 

They have been surrounded by every mod- 
ern convenience. 

They have worn costly fabrics. 

They have loaded their tables with choic- 
est of foods. 

They have bought every book they wanted, 
although they don't read them, but merely buy 
them to show off the fine bindings on their 
shelves and make a pretense of literary culture. 

They have sent their boys and girls to col- 
lege, from which, if the parents were not rich 
and powerful, most of them would be ex- 
pelled because they have been so pampered 
and spoiled by excessive luxury that they have 
become degenerate. 

They take their families and go trotting 
around the globe whenever they feel like it. 

They give balls that cost more than a work- 
ingman's wages amount to in a lifetime. 

Their whole life is a ceaseless round of lux- 
ury, gluttony and wasteful extravagance. 

And, yet, they have the colossal nerve to 
calmly assert that they are wealthy because 
they have abstained. 



82 what's so and what isn't 

And they have the still more colossal nerve 
to ask the workingmen to give them five or 
six hours a day of their labor for nothing, as 
a reward for their abstinence. 

The workingmen have done so. 

The workingmen by voting the republican 
and democratic tickets have voted to continue 
doing so. 

The capitalists are wealthy because the 
workingmen have been giving them five or 
six hours a day of their labor for nothing. 

In other words, they are wealthy because 
the workingmen have abstained. 



MATERIALISTS— RAINBOW CHASERS 

No, the Socialists are not rainbow chasers. 

The opponents of Socialism are rainbow 
chasers. 

Frequently some opponent of Socialism, in 
one breath, charges us with being rank materi- 
alists, who are concerned only with base, phys- 
ical, material things. 

And, in the next breath, he charges us with 
being rank idealists and rainbow chasers who 
are attempting to establish an impossible 
heaven on earth. 

Of course, these charges do not hang to- 
gether very well. But, then, as our critics are 
in the wrong, we' cannot expect them to be 
reasonable. 

We Socialists are neither rank materialists 
nor rank idealists. 



MATERIALISTS — RAINBOW CHASERS 83 

We have high ideals, but we do not spend 
our time dreaming about them. 

We recognize the fact that the reason men 
cannot approach their ideals, but are curbed 
and thwarted, is because their actions and 
aspirations are limited and governed by an 
unfavorable environment. 

We have our knife out for that environ- 
ment. 

When we lay that environment in its grave 
we propose to replace it with a better one. 

Men are chiefly the product of their environ- 
ment, and of heredity, which is chiefly com- 
posed of inherited environment. 

The nature of the environment of men is de- 
termined chiefly by economic conditions. 

Economic conditions are determined chiefly 
by the mode of producing and distributing the 
necessities and comforts of life. 

To make a radical change in the environ- 
ment, you have to change the mode of pro- 
duction and distribution. 

If the investigator will read a standard work 
on the economic interpretation of history a 
new light will dawn upon him. 

The economic conditions now prevailing 
make the environment of the average man such 
that he is condemned to starve himself men- 
tally, morally and spiritually, in order to escape 
physical starvation. He is compelled to scram- 
ble furiously for money enough to provide a 
bare existence for himself and family. 

We Socialists are not satisfied to have men 
compelled to spend their entire lives in escap- 
ing physical starvation and scrambling furi- 



84 what's so and what isn't 

ously for money enough to provide a bare 
existence. 

We know that under a rational system the 
world's industrial work can be done in less 
than half the time spent upon it under the 
present wasteful, unscientific, chaotic system. 

We want men to have the time and the 
means and the" opportunity to cultivate their 
higher natures. 

But we know that that can only be accom- 
plished by changing their environment. In 
other words, by abolishing capitalism and in- 
troducing Socialism. 

Therefore, when we are charged with being 
materialists or rank idealists, I reply that the 
Socialist is the only materialist who is not 
rank and he is likewise the only idealist who 
is not rank. He is neither a material groveler 
nor a rainbow chaser. 

The man who makes material ends his ulti- 
mate object is the material groveler. 

And the man who spends his life, as some 
opponents to Socialism do, in trying to get 
men to be decent under the present impossible 
conditions, instead of spending his life in abol- 
ishing those conditions and replacing them 
with conditions wherein men can be decent, is 
the rainbow chaser. 

The Socialist is practical. 



IMPRACTICABILITY 

No, Socialism is not impracticable. It is 
not a dream. 



IMPRACTICABILITY 85 

Capitalism is impracticable. It is a night- 
mare. 

Do you think a system which drives thou- 
sands of men to suicide is practicable? 

Do you think a system which drives thou- 
sands of people insane is practicable? 

Do you think a system w r hich drives mil- 
lions of men to drink is practicable? 

Do you think a system which drives hun- 
dreds of thousands of girls to prostitution is 
practicable? 

Do you think a system which throws hun- 
dreds of thousands of children into the indus- 
trial mill and grinds the life out of them is 
practicable? 

Do you think a system which deliberately 
manufactures hoboes is practicable? 

Do you think a system which puts a premium 
on dishonesty is practicable? 

Do you think a system which is an enemy 
of the family is practicable? 

Do you think a system which bars out the 
masses of the people from the higher things 
of life is practicable? 

Do you think a system which compels every- 
body to violate the Golden Rule is practicable? 

Do you think a system which takes the 
product of the useful worker away from him 
and hands it over to the useless capitalist is 
practicable? 

Capitalism is guilty of all these and many 
other crimes. And all of them are constantly 
growing worse. 

Capitalism is impracticable. It has been a 



86 WHAT S SO AND WHAT ISN T 

mere makeshift. It has been a mere stepping 
stone to something better. 

Socialism is practicable. 

Public ownership has already been demon- 
strated to be practicable. 

Of all the institutions now existing, if you 
want to see the ones which come the nearest 
to being models of efficiency, take a peep at 
the publicly owned postoffice, the publicly 
owned public schools, the publicly owned fire de- 
partments, the publicly owned water depart- 
ments, etc. These institutions have been oper- 
ated under very unfavorable circumstances. 
They have been operated in the interest of the 
capitalist class. And they have been set down 
in a system reeking with graft and corruption. 
They have been almost entirely without safe- 
guards from corruption. And yet they are 
the best models of efficiency now in existence. 

I do not believe in war, except for freedom, 
but I cannot help noticing the fact that the 
crews on the publicly owned vessels in the 
United States navy are more efficient than 
those on any privately owned vessel in the 
world. When the privately owned General 
Slocum went down, burning and drowning a 
thousand and twenty people, the ill-paid and 
undrilled crew was altogether unequal to the 
situation. They did not know how to handle 
the rafts and life-boats. They had never had 
a fire drill. They would not have known how 
to handle the hose even if it had not been 
rotten. They were panic stricken. They were 
worse than useless in trying to save the pas- 
sengers. Surely, inefficiency could not be car- 



IMPRACTICABILITY 87 

ried farther than that. Compare it with the 
marvelous efficiency of the crews of the pub- 
licly owned vessels at Manila and Santiago. 

The practicability of public ownership has 
already been completely demonstrated. 

If, however, we Socialists w r ere trying to get 
people to vote for public ownership against 
their own interests, or even merely aside from 
their own interests, we should be impractical. 

It is true that we sometimes appeal to senti- 
ment incidentally. We sometimes- depict the 
horrors of child slavery. We sometimes de- 
scribe the pitiable situation in which the 
women of the land are placed, etc. Some 
people can be reached in that way. It also 
serves to rivet attention. But it is entirely 
incidental. 

At this stage in the evolution of the human 
race a movement which appealed chiefly to 
sentiment would be doomed to stagnate. Only 
a limited number of people can be reached in 
that way. The great majority of men are 
governed by their own interests. 

The prohibition party is a sample of move- 
ments that are doomed to stagnate. The fact that 
it does not stand for anything basic ought to 
doom it, but, as the people have not yet got 
their bearings, that is not sufficient to account 
for its long drawn out failure. Its vote hovers 
around a quarter of a million, sometimes a lit- 
tle higher, sometimes a little lower, but not 
growing any in the long run. It appeals chiefly 
to sentiment. It has simply reached the out- 
side limit of a movement that appeals to senti- 



88 what's so and what isn't 

ment. It can't grow. It has reached its limit. 
It is impractical. 

If we Socialists were like the prohibitionists 
we should be impractical also. But we are 
not. 

We appeal primarily to the interest of the 
voters. 

It is absolutely to the interest of the wage 
workers to vote for Socialism. 

It is also to the interest of most of the farm- 
ers, most of the small business men and most 
of the small professional men, to vote for So- 
cialism. 

It is to the interest of at least ninety per 
cent of the voters of the United States to vote 
for Socialism. 

We appeal to their interest. 

If that is not practical, what is? 

Socialism is the natural solution of all the 
puzzles of society. It is the natural and only 
solution of the trust problem. Wealth is now 
in the hands of a few. The many are serv- 
ing the few. This has all been brought about 
by natural development. Natural development 
now dictates that these centralized industries 
shall be taken over by the public, so that all 
the people shall share in the results of this 
natural development. 

This is in the line of evolution. 

It is the only way to obey the law of pro- 
gress. 

It substitutes system for chaos. 

It is rational. 

It is sane. 



CLASS AGAINST CLASS 89 

It is the only practicable thing that can be 
done. 

It does not require angels to accomplish it. 

All it requires is the concentrated efforts of 
those to whose interest it is to attain it. 

All it requires is the application of common 
sense to society. 

All of the reforms and superficial remedies 
that are proposed as cures for social ills are 
mere hopeless floundering. 

They are attempts to patch a rotten garment. 

Socialism is common sense. 

It is natural. 

It is evolutionary. 

It is intensely practical. 



CLASS AGAINST CLASS 

No, the Socialists did not divide the people 
into classes. 

Capitalism divided the people into classes. 

The Socialists have merely been honest 
enough to recognize this fact and act accord- 
ingly, instead of blindfolding themselves and 
making believe that there were no classes. 

It is the mission, the logical and historic 
mission, of the working class to bear the brunt 
of the fight for the overthrow of capitalism and 
the introduction of Socialism. 

It is its mission to do so because it is to 
its proximate interest to do so. 

The Socialist movement is based upon this 



90 what's so and what isn't 

fact. It is based upon the class struggle be- 
tween the working class and the capitalist 
class. 

The term, class struggle, sounds harsh to 
those who have never heard it before. Gen- 
tle natures would prefer not to have any class 
struggle. 

But we have to deal with facts instead of 
wishes. 

The classes exist. 

It is not our fault that they exist. 

We wish they did not exist. 

But they do exist. 

And the capitalist class is constantly gnaw- 
ing at the vitals of the working class. 

We can't wipe the classes out of existence 
by closing our eyes and ignoring their exis- 
tence. We can only invite disaster that way. 

The only way to wipe them out of existence 
is by the oppressed class conquering the op- 
pressing class at the ballot box and absorbing it. 

It is to the proximate interest of the capital- 
ist class to continue the capitalist system, so 
that it can keep on exploiting the working 
class out of the bulk of the product of its toil. 

It is to the proximate interest of the working 
class to destroy the capitalist system and in- 
troduce Socialism, so as to abolish exploitation 
and secure the full product of its toil. 

The interests of the two classes are, there- 
fore, utterly antagonistic. 

I repeat that the reason the brunt of the bur- 
den of abolishing capitalism and introducing 
Socialism is placed upon the shoulders of the 
working class is because it is to the proximate 



WHO THROWS AWAY HIS VOTE? 91 

interest of the working class to do so. Because 
it is the only class that has nothing to lose but 
its chains, and has a world to gain. 

This is the line of battle. 

The working class against the capitalist 
class. 

To be sure, Socialism is ultimately to the 
interest of everybody. But people as a rule 
are swayed by their proximate, not by their 
ultimate, interest. 

As for the minor economic groups, the farm- 
ers, small business men, etc., the only sensible 
thing for them to do is to ally themselves 
with the class with which their interests are 
the most nearly identical, which happens to be 
the working class. 

The class struggle will continue until we 
win. 

Then, class distinctions will be abolished by 
abolishing the economic injustice which causes 
them. 



WHO THROWS AWAY HIS VOTE 

No, you do not throw away your vote when 
you vote the Socialist ticket. 

You throw away your vote when you vote a 
capitalist ticket, the republican or democratic 
ticket. 

The man who votes against his own interest 
is the one who throws away his vote. If you 
vote the republican or democratic ticket, you 
vote against your own interest. 



92 what's so and what isn't 

The republican and democratic parties stand 
for the continuation of the present system, 
which robs you. They are run in the interest 
of the capitalist class. 

If you vote the republican or democratic 
ticket you help to strengthen and perpetuate 
the rule of your enemies, so that they can con- 
tinue to rob you. 

Your ballot is a strong and heavy club. 

If you vote the republican or democratic 
ticket you hand that club over to the capitalist 
class, saying, "Please smash me over the head 
with that !" 

And they smash you, all right. 

If you vote the Socialist ticket, even though 
it does not win, you strengthen and build up 
the party which is destined to emancipate you. 

The only way you can avoid throwing away 
your vote is by voting the Socialist ticket. 

The onlv way in which you can make your vote 
hasten the day of your deliverance is by voting 
the Socialist ticket. 

To vote any other ticket is to vote to make 
your chains thicker. 

Socialism is not a far-off dream. If you have 
that erroneous notion in your head the sooner 
you get it out the better. 

Socialism is the next step. 

This is demonstrated by the great and con- 
stant increase in the Socialist vote all over the 
civilized world. 

The Socialist vote of the United States in- 
creased from ninety-six thousand in 1900 to 
four hundred and nine thousand in 1904. 

The Socialist vote of France increased from 



MAKING PEOPLE GOOD BY LAW 93 

forty-seven thousand in 1887 to «eight hundred 
and ninety-four thousand in 1906. 

The Socialist vote of Germany increased from 
thirty thousand in 1867 to three million and eight 
thousand in 1903. 

In 1870, the total Socialist vote of the world 
was in, round numbers, thirty thousand. 

In 1880, it was four hundred and thirty-eight 
thousand. 

In 1890, it was one million six hundred thou- 
sand. 

In 1900, it was four million six hundred thou- 
sand. 

In 1905, it was about seven million. 

No, Socialism is not a far off dream. 



MAKING PEOPLE GOOD BY LAW 

Can you make people good by law ? 

That depends on what you mean by making 
people good by law. 

If you should pass a law providing that "it is 
hereby enacted that John Smith shall be good/' 
it would in all probability not have the slightest 
beneficial effect upon John Smith. 

But, if you were to pass a law providing that 
John Smith should be surrounded by a good en- 
vironment, and then carry the provisions of that 
law into actual operation, John Smith would begin 
to get better right away. 

Capitalism uses the former method. 

Socialism will use the latter method. 

Capitalism provides by law that people shall 



94 what's so and what isn't 

not murder, nor steal, nor cheat, nor fight, nor 
adulterate, etc., etc. But the environment is such 
that they keep right on doing these things. 

Socialism will change the environment so that 
people will no longer be driven to do evil. 

Men are chiefly the product of their environ- 
ment. 

If their environment is bad, they are bad. 

If their environment is good, they are good. 

Under the present capitalist system, the en- 
vironment of all men is comparatively bad. All 
men are thereby compelled to be comparatively 
bad, whether they want to or not. 

It has been said that the province of govern- 
ment is to make it hard for men to do wrong and 
easy for them to do right. That is surely one 
of the provinces of government. 

But the present system does the exact opposite. 

It makes it hard for men to do right and 
easy for them to do wrong. 

Indeed, it compels them to do wrong. 

Socialism does not propose to pass a law pro- 
viding that "it is hereby enacted that all men shall 
be good." 

But it does propose to change the environment 
of men so that it will no longer be necessary for 
them to do wrong, so that it will be easy for them 
to do right and hard for them to do wrong. 

We propose to establish a social system in 
which it will not be to the interest of men to do 
wrong. 

It is perfectly evident that, under such cir- 
cumstances, men will become morally better. 



COM PETITION — STRUGGLE 9 5 



COMPETITION— STRUGGLE 

No, the struggle between human beings for a 
bare animal existence is not necessary to progress. 

It is a great barrier to progress. 

Benjamin Kidd, in his Social Evolution, has 
tried to make out that in the Socialist common- 
wealth the human race will degenerate because 
of the removal of the fierce struggle for a bare 
animal existence. And there are many other ene- 
mies of Socialism who agree with him. 

He lays it down as an absolute and invariable 
rule that every quality possessed by humanity is 
developed and maintained by conflict, by compe- 
tition, by ceaseless struggle of human beings with 
each other. And he draws from this false premise 
the conclusion that Socialism, by removing the 
competition for a bare animal existence, will de- 
generate and destroy all of the qualities of the 
human race. 

It is emphatically false that competition is the 
only factor in developing and maintaining human 
qualities. 

But I shall not enter into that question just 
now. For the present moment I will grant, for 
the sake of argument, that Mr. Kidd is right when 
he says that competition is the only factor in de- 
veloping and maintaining human qualities. Does 
it logically follow from that that Socialism will 
work the degeneracy of the human race? 

^ On the contrary, it follows logically that So- 
cialism ^yill remove the causes which are produc- 
ing the bad qualities of the human race, and will 
continue and develop the causes which are pro- 
ducing the good qualities of the human race. 



9G what's so and what isn't 

The trouble with Mr. Kidd is that he has com- 
mitted a glaring error in logic. 

Not only are his premises erroneous, but his 
conclusion is too big for his premises. I have 
agreed to overlook the falsity of his premises for 
the present, but I want to call attention to his 
too big conclusion. 

His mistake in logic may be illustrated in this 
way. It is as if Mr. Kidd had said: A river 
cannot have any water in it unless it has tribu- 
tary streams flowing into it. 

The sewers of the cities are tributary streams. 
Therefore, if the cities burn their sewage, in- 
stead of letting it flow into the river, the river 
will dry up. 

But, there are other tributary streams besides 
the sewers. 

Socialism does not propose to cut off any of 
those tributary streams which are bearing pure 
water into the river. 

It merely proposes to burn the sewage, and 
thus purify the river. 

Socialism does not propose to abolish compe- 
tition. 

It does propose to abolish competition for a bare 
animal existence. 

It does not propose to abolish competition for 
excellence, superiority and preeminence in the 
myriads of higher human activities. 

Competition in these myriads of higher activi- 
ties is so much more humane than the brutal com- 
petition for a mere animal existence that it might 
more properly be called emulation. But I will 
stick to Mr. Kidd's word and call it competition. 

It used to be quite customary among human 



COMPETITION — STRUGGLE 9? 

beings to compete with each other in physical 
strength. The stronger man killed the weaker 
man. That kind of competition developed blood- 
thirstiness. But bloodthirstiness is an undesirable 
quality. To do away with that quality is to de- 
velop, not to degenerate, humanity. Consequent- 
ly, it was a good thing for the human race when 
that custom largely passed out of existence. 

It is now a custom among human beings, forced 
upon them by the capitalist system, to compete 
with each other for enough money to buy the 
necessaries of life. The man who possesses more 
of the qualities necessary to succeed in that com- 
petition gets the money, while the man who pos- 
sesses less of the qualities necessary to succeed 
in that competition either starves to death, or at 
least starves mentally, morally and spiritually. 
That kind of competition develops greed, graft, 
dread, fear, jealousy, pride, vanity, narrow-mind- 
edness, ignorance, pessimism, hopelessness, mean- 
ness, stinginess, cowardice, craftiness, stealth, and 
other kindred qualities. 

But those are undesirable qualities. 

To do away with those qualities is to develop, 
not to degenerate, humanity. 

Consequently, it will be a good thing for the 
human race when those qualities are destroyed 
by the abolition of capitalism and the introduc- 
tion of Socialism. 

Socialism will remove the brutal and desperate 
competition for a bare animal existence. It will 
thereby give men a full and free opportunity to 
compete with each other for preeminence in such 
things as making products, managing industries, 
inventing machines, curing disease, developing 



98 what's so and what isn't 

any and all of the many arts and sciences, writ- 
ing books, painting pictures, and the thousands 
of other things which these suggest. 

In other words, Socialism, by abolishing the 
brutal and desperate struggle for a bare animal 
existence, will give men a full and free oppor- 
tunity to compete with each other for preemi- 
nence in all of the industrial arts, all of the fine 
arts, and all of the liberal arts. 

It will even give men a full and free oppor- 
tunity to compete with each other for preemi- 
nence in moral and spiritual things. 

It will even give men a full and free oppor- 
tunity to compete with each other for preeminence 
in doing good in the world, for excellence in al- 
truism, for excellence in unselfishness. 

It is perfectly evident that these species of com- 
petition, to which Socialism will give a free field, 
are of such a nature that each competitor, by 
competing, instead of dragging his fellow men 
down, must necessarily assist and elevate them. 
For, by doing any of these things better than 
other people can do them, he is doing other peo- 
ple a good turn. 

It is also perfectly evident that these species 
of competition, to which Socialism will give a 
free field, are of such a nature that they will de- 
velop manual dexterity, mental acumen, broad- 
mindedness, enlightentment, good will, cordiality, 
brotherhood, happiness, generosity, courage, hon- 
esty, magnanimity, liberality, kindness, buoyancy, 
gladness, hopefulness, optimism, cheerfulness, 
purity, self-possession, love, and other kindred 
qualities. 

But those are eminently desirable qualities. 



COM PETITION — STRUGGLE 99 

To develop them is to develop, not to degener- 
ate, humanity. 

Consequently, even if Mr. Kidd's rule that 
competition is the only factor in the development 
of human qualities were correct, it would neces- 
sarily and inevitably follow that Socialism, in- 
stead of degenerating the human race, is abso- 
lutely necessary to the development of the human 
race, because it alone can abolish those kinds of 
competition which develop brutal and undesir- 
able qualities, and it alone can give men a full 
and free opportunity to engage in those kinds of 
competition which develop higher and eminently 
desirable qualities. 

Thus, the desperate and hard pushed enemies 
of Socialism are convicted out of their own 
mouths. 

In so far as competition is a factor in the de- 
velopment of human qualities, Socialism will strip 
it of its villainous and degenerating features and 
turn it to good advantage. 

But, as a matter of fact, competition is not 
the only factor in the development of human 
qualities. 

It is not even the chief factor in the develop- 
ment of the higher human qualities. 

It has been the chief factor in the development 
of the brutal and undesirable human qualities. 

But it is only a minor factor in the develop- 
ment of the higher human qualities. 

Co-operation is the dominant factor in the de- 
velopment of the higher human qualities. 

Competition is one of the vital principles of 
the universe. 

But it operates chiefly in a comparatively low 

tore. 



100 what's so and what isn't 

sphere, at a comparatively low stage of progress. 

Co-operation is also one of the vital principles 
of the universe. 

But it operates chiefly in a comparatively high 
sphere, at a comparatively advanced stage of 
progress. 

However, just as we find a mild form of com- 
petition in operation in the higher spheres, so also 
we find a mild form of co-operation in the lower 
spheres. 

I am only repeating what has already been 
pointed out by others when I say that we find 
co-operation in the animal and vegetable worlds 
and even in the so-called inorganic world. 

What is it, for example, that keeps the earth 
in its orbit? 

Why, if the stars and planets did not co-oper- 
ate with each other to hold it in its place, it would 
go crashing through space and be shivered into 
countless fragments by contact with some larger 
sphere. That is co-operation in the so-called in- 
organic world. 

Almost every plant has a flower with bright, 
beautiful petals. /These petals attract the bees 
and other insects. These insects help to distri- 
bute the pollen, thus insuring fertilization and re- 
production. That is co-operation between the 
vegetable and animal worlds. 

Among the lower animals, those which sur- 
vive in the greatest numbers are the ones which 
co-operate with each other. In other words, those 
which go in droves or herds, like the elephant, 
the buffalo, the deer, the antelope, the wild-goat, 
the sheep, the wolf, the jackal, the reindeer, the 
hippopotamus, the zebra, the hyena, and the seal. 



MENTAL LABOR 101 

Among men, we owe all the civilization we 
have to co-operation. 

If we did not co-operate at all we should have 
stark anarchy. 

The trouble is that we have not carried co- 
operation far enough. We are permitting it to 
remain imperfect and incomplete. 

We must carry it to its logical and natural con- 
clusion. 

We have come to a point where we can not 
make any further progress unless we do. 

We are socially marking time, because we are 
ready for Socialism and yet capitalism is still 
hanging on. 

Capitalism has outlived its usefulness. 

It is now a detriment. 

It is a barrier in the way of progress. 

It is like an iron band around the wrist of ?. 
youth. 

The wrist cannot develop until the band is 
removed. 



MENTAL LABOR 

No, Socialism will not discourage mental labor. 

Capitalism discourages mental labor. 

Capitalism prevents the vast majority of child- 
ren from getting a good education. 

Capitalism also prevents the vast majority of 
adults from cultivating their minds. 

Under capitalism, higher education is a hin- 
drance to true success. 

For a number of years the Bowery Branch of 



102 what's so and what isn't 

the Y. M. C. A. in New York has discovered by 
actual investigation that more than twenty-five 
per cent of the men who apply for aid at that in- 
stitution are men who have been educated in 
university, college, academy, or high school. 

The startling enormity of these figures will be 
realized when we consider that less than two per 
cent of the youth of the United States graduate 
from high school, and less than one-half of one 
per cent graduate from college. 

It is impossible for one to go through a higher 
institution of learning without taking on some 
measure of refinement and culture, which makes 
it disgusting for him to have to work all the petty 
grafts and stoop to the brutalities that are neces- 
sary in order to get ahead under capitalism. Of 
course, many of them swallow their qualms, 
chloroform their consciences, and go in to win. 
When they do that, their superior intelligence 
enables them to outstrip many of their competi- 
tors. So, they are well represented among "suc- 
cessful" politicians and "successful" business 
men. 

But when such a man holds on to his aversion 
to being a grafter, he too often finds himself 
crowded out. Not being skilled in any trade, 
he also finds it difficult to make a living by man- 
ual labor. Hence, the disproportionately large 
percentage of these men among the unemployed 
and the tramps. 

Capitalism puts a premium on mere superficial 
business education. It discourages broad and lib- 
eral education. 

Socialism will not only give everybody an op- 
portunity to secure a broad and liberal educa- 



MENTAL LABOR 103 

tion, but it will also make a broad and liberal edu- 
cation an advantage in life, instead of a detriment. 

Socialism does not propose to abolish mental 
labor and give the entire product of society to 
manual labor. 

When we speak of the working class, we do 
not mean merely those who work with their 
hands, but those who work with their brains as 
well. The fact is that every worker works with 
both brain and hands. In some cases, the one 
preponderates ; in other cases the other prepon- 
derates. 

Those newspapers and orators who take de- 
light in building up a straw man, naming him So- 
cialism, and then knocking him down, frequently 
say that the Socialists intend to get along with- 
out brains, that they despise men who have a 
genius for managing industries, that they think 
such men are socially useless, and that they pro- 
pose to attempt to get along without them. 

This, of course, is nonsense. 

The man who has a genius for managing in- 
dustries will be sure of a good job in the Social- 
ist commonwealth. 

He will be in demand. 

We honor him for his ability now. 

He is usually a hired man. 

The real capitalist does not manage the in- 
dustries. He sits in his office and figures out 
ways and means of investing his money to the 
best advantage. He owns stock in dozens of cor- 
porations and takes practically no part in the 
management of any of them. At the most he 
attends a meeting of the board of directors now 



104 what's so and what isn't 

and then and has his say regarding the general 
policy of the business. 

But the actual managing is done by the man- 
agers, the superintendents, the foremen, etc. 
Sometimes they are stockholders, sometimes not. 
In so far as they draw an income from invest- 
ments, they are capitalists also. But, in so far 
as they do the actual work of managing industry, 
they do necessary and useful social labor and are 
entitled to compensation therefor. 

A capitalist is only a capitalist in so far as he 
rakes into his own coffers the earnings of others 
by owning the means of production and distribu- 
tion, directly or indirectly. He may get this in- 
come through dividends, or rent, or interest, or 
profits, or unearned salary. He may draw a big 
salary without doing anything. Or, he may draw 
a salary altogether out of proportion to his ac- 
tual labor, so that most of it, or a part of it, is 
unearned. But, when he does take a hand in 
production or distribution himself, by doing some 
of the actual useful work of managing industry, 
to that extent he is not a capitalist, but a useful 
worker. Socialism fully recognizes this. And , 
Socialism proposes only to abolish his function as 
a capitalist. It does not propose to abolish his 
function as a brain worker. 

Socialism proposes to pay the brain worker for 
his brain work, not for investments. 



BOOK-KEEPING—PROPORTIONING OF INCOMES 

No, Socialism does not mean endless book- 
keeping. 



BOOK-KEEPING — PROPORTIONING OF INCOMES 105 

Capitalism means endless bookkeeping. 

Under the present capitalist system, each sepa- 
rate business, big and little, has to have its com- 
plete system of account books. Taking them al- 
together, the term, endless bookkeeping, is scarce- 
ly an exaggeration. 

Socialism, by bringing system out of the pres- 
ent chaos, will reduce the amount of bookkeeping 
to the minimum. 

But, shall we not have to have a myriad of ex- 
pert mathematicians and bookkeepers to calcu- 
late how much each worker produces every day 
and keep account of it? 

I do not think so. 

The fact that some workers will be doing distri- 
butive work which could not well be calculated 
in that manner would make it difficult to carry 
such a project into effect. 

It is not necessary. 

A mathematician can calcuate the distance from 
the earth to the sun without measuring it with 
a yardstick or a tapeline. It would be difficult 
to do that. There is an easier way. 

So also the real value of each worker's work 
can be calculated without measuring it up and 
figuring it out. It would be difficult to do that. 
There is an easier way. 

The universal introduction of labor saving ma- 
chinery, and the consequent division of labor, 
have made the production of men so nearly equal 
that the difference in incomes will not be large. 

But, in so far as there is a difference, it can 
be accurately ascertained by permitting free play 
to the law of supply and demand. 

The compensation in any given occupation can 



106 what's so and what isn't 

be raised, or, what amounts to the same thing, 
the hours can be shortened, until exactly the 
right number of men are attracted to that occu- 
pation. 

If too many apply, the compensation can be 
lowered, or the hours lengthened, until the right 
number remains. 

Add to this the fact that the workers in any 
industry can dock anyone who shirks, and you 
have an accurate automatic method of giving each 
worker the actual value of his work, without any 
slavish figuring and calculating. 

Devotees of capitalism who are so absurdly 
fearful lest Socalism should destroy incentive will 
please note that this method retains the incentive 
to gain a higher income or shorter hours. 



SAVING 



No, saving would not make the people pros- 
perous. 

Saving would bring on a disastrous panic. 

Some people are sincerely of the opinion that 
the woeful condition of the people at the present 
time is due to improvidence. They think the 
masses of the people could save money if they 
would. And they think it would be a good idea 
for them to do so. 

The masses of the people do not get money 
enough to provide a decent living by spending all 
of it. 

The average wage is about four hundred and 
thirty-seven dollars a year. 



SAVING 107 

That settles that part of the question. 

But, if the workingmen did skimp themselves 
still more than they already do, and did manage 
thereby to save some money, their wages would 
be cut down just that much. 

Their saving money would be proof that they 
could live on less than they are living on now. 
Therefore their wages would be cut down. For, 
wages, in the long run, always seek the level of 
subsistence, under the preselit system. In other 
words, the workingmen as a whole get enough 
to live on and enable them to reproduce new 
workers. Labor is a commodity. It is bought 
for what it costs to produce it, namely, what it 
costs for the laborers barely to live and to raise 
children to take their places. 

This is the iron law of wages. 

It will continue to govern wages as long as 
capitalism exists. 

Consequently, if the workingmen were to save 
money on a large scale their wages would be 
cut down to the same extent. 

Then, there is another feature about this mat- 
ter of saving. 

Saving, under the present system, is a good 
thing for anindividual, provided other people do 
not save. 

If all the people saved, it would be a bad thing 
for all of them. 

How do I figure that out? 

I will tell you. 

There are about thirty million persons in the 
United States who are engaged in gainful occu- 
pations. Suppose each one of those thirty mil- 
lion persons should begin to save a dollar a week. 



108 what's so and what isn't 

That would draw thirty million dollars a week 
out of circulation. A howl of despair would go 
up from the people who are running the retail 
stores where that thirty million dollars a week 
is now being spent. There would be thirty million 
dollars a week less of purchases at the retail 
stores. Many of the retail stores would therefore 
go to the wall, and the others would have to dis- 
charge thousands of clerks and delivery men, and 
quit buying something less than thirty million dol- 
lars a week of goods from the jobbers. Some of 
the jobbers would therefore go to the wall and the 
others would be compelled to discharge thousands 
of clerks, bookkeepers, etc., and quit buying some- 
thing less than thirty million dollars a week of 
goods from the manufacturers. Some of the man- 
ufacturers would therefore go to the wall, and 
the others would have to discharge thousands of 
men because they could not sell their products. 
The saving itself and the closing down of indus- 
tries would reduce the demand for coal, and thou- 
sands of miners would be discharged. The sav- 
ing itself and the throwing of men out of em- 
ployment and thus cutting off their purchasing 
power so that they could not buy the usual amount 
of farm products would cause the price of farm 
products to go down. The farmers would have 
to take lower prices for their products. Their 
own purchasing power would thereby be reduced, 
so that they could not purchase as much as usual 
from the retail stores. Still more retail stores 
would therefore go to the wall and drag still 
more jobbers and manufacturers down with them. 
All of these people would be unable to meet their 
loans at the banks. The banks would collapse 



SAVING 109 

like pricked bubbles. All other industries would 
be drawn into the general ruin. And we would 
be plunged into an acute industrial crisis, with 
millions of men out of employment and millions 
of women and children crying for bread. 

So, you see, that, while saving is a good thing 
for an individual so long as other people do not 
save, it would be a great disaster for all the peo- 
ple to save. 

But, you say, while it is true that in order to 
save the thirty million dollars per week it would 
of course be necessary for the people to refrain 
from buying that much from the retail stores, it 
does not necessarily follow that they must hoard 
the money. They might invest it in business en- 
terprises. 

How could they? 

They could not profitably invest it in whole- 
sale or retail business enterprises when the de- 
mand for goods had' been cut down thirty million 
dollars per week and stores and jobbers were 
consequently going to the wall. 

They could not profitably invest it in produc- 
tive, manufacturing enterprises, because that 
would increase the supply when the demand had 
been reduced and would make the disaster worse 
than ever. 

There is no way around it. 

The fact is that there is no virtue in saving. 

Saving is not a virtue ; it is merely a necessity, 
if one would escape financial worry under the 
present system. 

A system which compels people to attempt to 
save for old age is vicious. The people ought 
not to have to save, or attempt to save, for old age. 



110 what's so and what isn't 

They ought to he perfectly free to spend their 
incomes for their physical, mental, moral and 
spiritual development, without having to worry 
as to whether or not they are going to starve to 
death in their old age. 

Socialism will provide conditions under which 
every person will have sufficient income to enable 
him to develop himself, physically, mentally, mor- 
ally and spiritually. Moreover, in consideration 
of his services during the prime of his life, So- 
cialism will give him an old age pension. In 
other words, his compensation will go right on 
after he gets too old to work. 

He will, therefore, be safe in using his money 
to avail himself of the higher things of life. In- 
stead of pinching and skimping, he can use his 
money to broaden his mind and make himself 
an intelligent and useful citizen. 

It will not be necessary for him to save for old 
age. 

It will only be necessary for him to save enough 
for the immediate future. And his income will 
be sufficiently large so that it will be an easy 
matter for him to do that without pinching. 



THE DIRTY WORK 

Who will do the dirty work of the Socialist 
commonwealth ? 

You needn't worry about that; Til do it my- 
self. 

It has been suggested that we have the repub- 



THE DIRTY WORK 111 

lican and democratic politicians do it, because 
they are used to doing dirty work. 

But I will relieve them of the task. I'll do it 
myself. 

The reason I will do it is because the hours of 
labor will be shorter in that employment than in 
any other, and I will, therefore, have most of 
my time to read, to study, and improve myself. 
I will have time to attend a university and study 
astronomy, and biology, and geology, and zool- 
ogy, and chemistry, and mathematics, and lan- 
guage, and philosophy, and music, and art, and 
literature, and other attractive subjects too nu- 
merous to mention. 

And I know a lot of bright fellows who will 
help me to do the dirty work for the same rea- 
son. 

But the work won't be dirty very long. 

When we post-graduate university students get 
out in our overalls doing the dirty work, one of 
my fellow workers will say, "Work, you're a stu- 
dent of science; you will be a disgrace to our 
university if you don't invent a machine to do this 
dirty work." 

And I will reply, "You're another !" 

Then we will begin to discuss the question in 
earnest, and we will all go home with the under- 
standing that we are all to spend our spare time 
trying to figure out that machine. 

We will combine our efforts. 

In a few weeks the machine will be doing the 
work. 

So, you can quit worrying about it. 



112 what's so and what isn't 

SUPPLY AND DEMAND 

No, Socialism will not repeal the law of supply 
and demand. 

But, shall we not have to fix arbitrarily the 
prices of products? 

I do not think so. But if it were necessary it 
would not be impossible. It is done to a large 
extent under the present system. 

The capitalistic United States government has 
set the price of the letter postage stamps sold in 
its postoffices at two cents. You can always 
find stamps at the postoffice, and you can always 
find butter at the grocery. The supply of stamps 
varies fully as much as the supply of butter does. 
The demand for stamps varies fully as much as 
the demand for butter does. The variation in the 
supply of' butter and the demand for butter 
causes the price of butter to fluctuate. But the 
variation in the supply of stamps and the de- 
.mand for stamps does not cause the price of 
stamps to fluctuate. 

Has the capitalistic United States government 
repealed the law of supply and demand? 

No, it has not repealed it, but it has set it 
aside. It has arbitrarily fixed the price of stamps. 

If there were a thoroughly organized butter 
trust, it could arbitrarily fix the price of butter, 
too. 

The trusts do constantly set aside the law 
of supply and demand by arbitrarily fixing prices. 
For example, the price- of oil is not fixed by the 
law of supply and demand at all. It is arbitrarily 
fixed by the oil trust. 



ALWAYS HAS BEEN AND ALWAYS WILL RE 113 

These instances demonstrate that the law of 
supply and demand can be regulated. 

We Socialists do not propose to attempt to re- 
peal the law of supply and demand, any more 
than the United States government and the trusts 
have done so. If it is necessary, we will set it 
aside, as they have done. 

But I do not think it will be necessary. I can 
see no reason why we should have to fix arbi- 
trarily the prices of products. 

Of course, it will be necessary for us to put 
products into the hands of the consumer at their 
real value. 

But, when profitmongers and middlemen are 
eliminated, the price of a product fixed by the 
law of supply and demand will, in my judgment, 
substantially coincide with its real value. 

The object will thus be accomplished automati- 
cally. 



ALWAYS HAS BEEN AND ALWAYS WILL BE 

No, things have not always been this way and 
they will not always be this way. 

Things have always changed continually. 

The man who can't see that must be blind, in- 
deed. 

We have always had street cars, for example, 
haven't we? 

We always have had steam railways and we 
always will have them ! It is all a dream that 
people used to ride in stage coaches ! And there 
is no prospect of electricity ever taking the place 
of steam ! 



114 what's so and what isn't 

Certain muddle heads have tried to make us 
believe that the lights which appeared in the bel- 
fry on the night when Paul Revere watched for 
the signal and then made his memorable midnight 
ride from Boston to Lexington were made with 
tallow candles. But everybody knows that the 
colonial heroes merely turned on the electric 
lights ! We have electric lights now, and, as 
things always have been this way, it follows that 
they had them in colonial days! 

The historians have tried to delude the people 
by telling them that the negroes of the South 
were once chattel slaves and that two million 
soldiers went down there and freed them from 
chattel slavery ! But that is all a hoax ! The 
negroes of the South are now working for wages, 
and, as things always have been this way, it fol- 
lows that they always have been wage slaves and 
never were chattel slaves at all! , 

What nonsense ! 

Things were not this way ten thousand years 
ago, nor five thousand years ago, nor one thou- 
sand years ago, nor five hundred years ago, nor 
one hundred years ago, nor fifty years ago, nor 
even ten years ago. 

Before civilization began, society was not di- 
vided into classes. There was no master class. 
The tribes lived in a state of communism — not 
Socialism, but communism — and men made no 
attempt whatever to outdo or overreach one 
another financially. 

For several centuries after civilization began, 
the people were divided into masters and chattel 
slaves. 



MONEY 115 

For several centuries after that they were di- 
vided into feudal lords and serfs. 

And, after the feudal system had run its course, 
the present wage system, or capitalist system, be- 
gan. 

Even seventy-five years ago, in this very United 
States, wealth was quite equitably distributed, and 
the people had approximately equal opportuni- 
ties. 

Even fifty years ago, the concentration of 
wealth into the hands of a few had not progressed 
very far. 

Even twenty-five years ago, it had by no means 
reached its present stage. 

Even ten years ago, the centralization of the 
industries into trusts and combines had not 
reached anything like its present stage of com- 
pletion. 

Labor saving machinery in all industries has 
developed and changed like a kaleidoscope be- 
fore our very eyes. 

Decidedly, things have not always been this 
way. 

Still more decidedly, things will not always 
be this way. 

This is a world of change, not of stagnation. 



MONEY 



How is the Socialist commonwealth going to 
get along without money? 

It is not going to get along without money. 

Even if the somewhat fanciful labor check 
should be adopted, it would be money. 



116 what's so and what isn't 

But I do not know of any good reason why 
the dollar should not be retained. 

It goes without saying that Socialism will 
abolish the national banking system. The money, 
of whatever kind it may be, will be issued by the 
public. 

Of course, in the Socialist commonwealth labor 
will be the real measure of value, and money will 
merely be its expression. But labor can be ex- 
pressed in dollars and cents as easily as in hours 
and minutes. 

The dollar is not the cause of our present evils. 
Private ownership of the industries is the cause. 
When the industries are transformed from pri- 
vate to public, the sting is taken out of the dol- 
lar. It is rendered harmless. We can make fur- 
ther use of it without danger. 

It is not the purpose of Socialism to discard 
anything that is useful. 

The wonderfully luminous and marvelously 
convenient decimal system on which the dollar 
is based is not a thing to be lightly cast aside. 

Besides, the people are thoroughly familiar with 
it. The retention of the dollar and cent would 
go a long way toward making the transition from 
capitalism to Socialism smooth. 

Furthermore, there will be artists, authors, lec- 
turers, preachers, special teachers, farmers, and 
others, in the Socialist commonwealth, who will 
not be working for the public. Our money will 
have to be sufficiently elastic to permit us, as indi- 
viduals or private organizations, to purchase these 
people's wares, without vexatious red tape. The 
dollar seems to fill the bill better than anything 
else. 



HUMAN NATURE 117 

Anyway, we shall have money of some kind, 
and you will have a vote as to what kind it shall 
be. 



HUMAN NATURE 

No, we shall not have to change human nature 
in order to introduce Socialism. 

But if we did; we should only be doing what is 
being done every day. For human nature is con- 
stantly being changed. 

No change whatever in human nature is nec- 
essary in order to introduce Socialism, to abolish 
exploitation, to abolish poverty, to establish eco- 
nomic justice, and to operate the industries suc- 
cessfully. 

While we Socialists sometimes appeal to men's 
moral sentiments and their ideals, we appeal chief- 
ly to their self-interest. 

It is to the self-interest of the masses of men to 
vote for Socialism. 

The masses of men at the present time are 
governed chiefly by their self-interest. 

Consequently, no change whatever in human 
nature is necessary in order to get men to vote 
for Socialism. All they have to do is to vote for 
their self-interest. 

And when the Socialist party wins, no change 
whatever in human nature will be necessary in 
order to successfully operate the industries and 
insure justice to all the people. 

A carpenter, or a merchant, or a farmer does 
not have to change his nature in order to become 



118 what's so and what isn't 

a postmaster or a mail carrier, working for the 
public. 

A woman does not have to change her nature in 
order to become a librarian or a teacher, working 
for the public. 

Neither will people have to change their nature 
in order to work for the public in the Socialist 
commonwealth. 

All that will be necessary to make the Socialist 
commonwealth a brilliant success, from the ordi- 
nary point of view, will be for men to follow their 
self-interest and try to achieve the greatest pos- 
sible individual success for themselves. The na- 
ture of Socialism is such that one can only ele- 
vate himself by elevating everybody else. 

So, to achieve success in the first stages and 
the primary objects of Socialism, no change what- 
ever in human nature is necessary. 

But, after the first stages of Socialism have 
been passed, after the primary objects of Social- 
ism have been attained, after poverty and exploi- 
tation have been abolished^ and after economic 
justice has been secured, it is expected that So- 
cialism will gradually develop in its ideal beauty, 
that men will gradually lose their lower instincts, 
that they will become more interested in making 
the human race happy than in making themselves 
happy. In short, that selfishness will to a very 
large degree give way to unselfishness. In order 
to attain this advanced or ideal stage of Socialism, 
human nature will have to be changed. It will 
have to evolve to a higher stage of development. 
And Socialism will provide the conditions where- 
in it will be easy for human nature to make that 
change. 



HUMAN NATURE 119 

It would be strange indeed if human nature 
were unchangeable. 

Human nature is not a fixed quantity. 

It is not always the same. 

It is a growth. 

The whole world is a growth. 

The earth itself began a gaseous mass and came 
to its present condition through a process of evo- 
lution. 

The infinite and wonderful varieties of the 
"vegetable kingdom came up from lower forms by 
an analogous system of development. 

Every species of animal life was produced in 
the same way. 

Can it be possible that man stands alone in the 
midst of an universe of 'development, a clod, a 
stone, immovable, unprogressive, stagnant, hope- 
less? 

It is not so. 

Man is the noblest product of evolution. He 
is immeasurably the highest product of the ages. 

He has come up to his present stage of evolu- 
tion from the lowest depths. 

Human nature has been undergoing a gradual 
and fundamental change ever since man began. 

At first his nature was that of a brute. 

The brute nature has gradually, little by little, 
been thrown off. Altruism, unselfishness, thought- 
fulness of others, have gradually, little by little, 
been taken on. This has gone on until at the 
present time, although man is still in a glaringly 
imperfect condition, yet his nature is now as high 
above the point from which he started as the 
blue vault of heaven is above the center of the 
earth. 



120 what's so and what isn't 

The chief factor in this constant change in 
human nature has been environment. 

Man is chiefly the product of his environment. 

Men are as good as their surroundings will 
let them be. 

They are still governed chiefly by self-interest 
because the economic conditions by which they 
are surrounded make them so. 

When Socialism surrounds them with economic 
conditions wherein it will not be necessary for 
them to strive ever and always to down their fel- 
low men, it is, therefore, logical to expect that 
human nature will change for the better with 
vastly greater rapidity than under the present 
cannibalistic system, and that men will continu- 
ally become more and more unselfish until the 
ideal stage of Socialism is reached. 

Meantime, let me remind you, as I said at th<* 
outset, that, in order to introduce Socialism, to 
abolish poverty and exploitation, to establish eco- 
nomic justice, to manage the industries success- 
fully, and to give everybody full and free access 
to the higher things of life, no change whatever 
in human nature is necessary, because it is to the 
self-interest of the masses of the people to do 
these things. 



CONFISCATION 



No, Socialism will not confiscate the earnings 
of the industrious. 

Capitalism confiscates the earnings of the in- 
dustrious. 



CONFISCATION 121 

Capitalism takes the bulk of the earnings of 
the wage worker right away from him and hands 
them over to the capitalist. 

It also takes the bulk of the earnings of the 
farmer away from him and hands them over to 
the capitalist. 

There are some capitalists who were- once me- 
chanics, or farmers, or laborers of some kind, and 
who actually earned at least a portion of what 
they possess. In order to do justice to them, 
it will be necessary for Socialism to compen- 
sate them for that portion of their property which 
represents the product of their honest toil. This, 
in my judgment, can best be done by pensioning 
them. 

But the property which has been actually 
earned by its possessors is scarcely a drop in the 
bucket. 

The great overwhelming bulk of the industries 
have not been earned by the men who own them. 

The men who own them have acquired them 
by appropriating to themselves the earnings of 
others. 

In other words, they have stolen them. 

It is true that they have stolen them legally. 
Or, at least, they have stolen a large portion of 
them legally. 

But legal stealing is no more right than illegal 
stealing. 

A capitalist has no more right to property 
which he did not earn than a burglar has. 

This property ought, therefore, to be confisca- 
ted. It ought to be restored to its rightful own- 
ers, the whole people. 



122 what's so and what isn't 

Society has a right to do whatever is best for 
society at large. 

It is a law of nature that the interest of the 
individual shall be subordinated to the interest 
of the species. 

Access to the means of production and distri- 
bution is positively necessary to any life, liberty, 
or pursuit of happiness worthy of the name. The 
private ownership of the means of production and 
distribution debars the masses of the people from 
access to them. It is not only right that we should 
wrest the means of production and distribution 
from the private owners, but it would also be 
right to compel them in addition, to pay us dam- 
ages for having deprived us of our rightful prop- 
erty and liberty in the past. 

Our forefathers set us an example of confisca- 
tion half a century ago. 

They confiscated four million slaves, worth on 
the market something like four billion dollars. 
It was for the best interest of society at large 
that this should be done. The interest of the in- 
dividual slave owner was subordinated to that of 
society. 

The code of every state in the union provides 
that after a debt has remained unpaid for a cer- 
tain length of time it shall become outlawed, or, 
as the lawyers say, it shall become barred by the 
statute of limitations. The debtor still owes you 
the money just as much as ever, but you can- 
not collect it from him. Society permits him 
to confiscate the amount from you by providing 
by law that you cannot collect it. The idea is 
that it is not best for society as a whole that 
these old matters should be allowed to hang on. 



CONFISCATION 123 

The interest of the individual creditor is sub- 
ordinated to that of society. 

Under the provisions of the bankruptcy law. 
any man who owes more than he can pay can be 
relieved of the obligation to pay the balance of 
his debts, after turning in what property he now 
possesses. In other words, he can confiscate the 
balance of what he owes. The idea is that it is 
not best for society at large that men who are 
swamped with debt should be compelled to stag- 
ger along under the load. The interest of the 
individual creditors is subordinated to that of so- 
ciety at large. 

To confiscate the means of production and dis- 
tribution would be to carry out the same principle 
of subordinating the interest of the individual to 
that of society at large. The confiscation of the 
slaves, the statute of limitations, and the bank- 
ruptcy law furnish abundant precedents for the 
application of that principle, if you want any pre- 
cedents. 

The private ownership of the means of pro- 
duction and distribution cannot be defended for 
an instant. 

You can no more justify it than you can justi- 
fy the owning a chattel slave. I have demon- 
strated this in the chapter on Compensation for 
Risk. 

It is impossible to do absolute justice in this 
matter. 

To do absolute justice would necessitate com- 
pelling the capitalist class to compensate the rest 
of the people, not merely for the stolen property, 
but also for blighted lives, lack of education, the 
death of loved ones, crowded insane asylums, sor- 



124 what's so and what isn't 

row, anguish, suicide, crime, prostitution, and all 
the rest of the horrors of capitalism. 

But it is an impossibility for the capitalist class 
to either pay for these things or make them right 
in any way whatsoever. 

So, it is impossible to do absolute justice in the 
matter. 

The question, then, is how to come as near 
doing justice as possible. 

Some have suggested that we build competing 
plants and let the old ones rot. That would not 
only be a waste of effort, but it would also be 
roundabout confiscation, because it would make 
the old plants valueless. 

Others have suggested that we pay the posses- 
sors and then Lax the money back into the public 
treasury. But that would also be roundabout: con- 
fiscation. 

For my part, I prefer the most direct and 
straightforward methods of doing things. If a 
majority of the American people decide to pay 
for the property taken, or to confiscate it in some 
roundabout manner, they have the sovereign right 
to do so. But, personally, I am in favor of point- 
blank confiscation of all property used for ex- 
ploitation, except such property as represents the 
product of honest toil on the part of its posses- 
sors. I am in favor of compensating the latter by 
pensioning them. I am also in favor of pension- 
ing all old people and all disabled people, whether 
exploiters or exploited. 



POPULAR MANAGEMENT 12£ 



POPULAR MANAGEMENT 

No, public ownership alone is not Socialism. 

When an industry is merely publicly owned, it 
is only half socialized. 

It is not fully socialized until it is popularly 
managed, as well as publicly owned. 

At the present time our publicly owned insti- 
tutions are as a rule not popularly managed. In- 
stead of being ruled from the bottom, they are 
ruled from the top. 

Take the postoffice for example. It is a mag- 
nificent institution, but it is only half socialized. 
It is publicly owned, but it is not popularly man- 
aged. The postmaster general is appointed by 
the president. All the local postmasters are also 
appointed from above. So are the heads of de- 
partment, and the foremen, managers, superin- 
tendents, head clerks, etc. 

In other words, the system of management is 
upside down. 

Socialism will turn it right side up. 

The men and women who work in the postoffice 
department should elect the foremen, managers, 
superintendents, and heads of departments, and 
should have complete power to discharge these 
officials at any time. The postmaster general 
should be elected, either by the people in general, 
or by the workers in the postoffice department. 
The local postmasters should be elected, either by 
the people of the communities they serve, or by 
the workers in the department in those localities. 
The general public should of course retain its 
right to exercise general supervision over the de- 
partment and to alter or veto anything that does 



126 what's so and what isn't 

not suit it. 

That would be popular management of the- 
postoffice department. 

If such a system of management were in vogue, 
the department would be freed from the petty ty- 
ranny now exercised by the postmaster general, 
the local postmasters, and other officials. If they 
became offensive and unduly officious then, a vote 
would be taken on them and their official heads 
would come off. 

The president of the United States should also 
be shorn of his despotic power over the depart- 
ment. He not only can, but does, tyrannize over 
the workers in the department. In 1904, the rural 
mail carriers set about in a perfectly orderly and 
peaceable manner to try to get Congress to raise 
their salaries. But the president of the United 
States peremptorily discharged the officers of the 
carriers' organization from the postal service and 
commanded the rest of them to desist from their 
efforts to influence Congress in their own behalf. 

The President himself was working for the 
public just as they were. And he himself was 
taking an active part in politics, but he would not 
permit them to do so, although they were doing 
it in a mild and inoffensive manner. 

The President himself was getting fifty thous- 
and dollars a year for his services to the public, 
but he vigorously reprimanded them for trying to 
increase their tiny wages. 

Neither the President nor any other official 
should have any power to tyrannize over public 
employes. Public employes, whether elected by 
popular vote, or by their fellow employes, or se- 
lected under civil service regulations, should be 



THE GOOD MAN FALLACY 127 

perfectly free to take an active part in politics. 
They have just as much right to do so as the 
President has. There is no excuse whatever for 
compelling them to resign their rights of citizen- 
ship when they enter the public service. 

Socialism will sweep away all those wretched 
little tyrannies. 

Socialism will introduce popular management, 
not merely in the postoffice department, but in all 
other industries owned by the public. 

Some people have had an idea that Socialism 
meant that we would all be bossed by a lot of of- 
ficials. 

But those people were not aware that Socialism 
means the popular management, as well as the 
public ownership, of the industries. 

The officials will be at our mercy. 

We can deprive them of their jobs whenever we 
feel like it. 

Under such circumstances, they will know their 
place and will conduct themselves with becoming 
humility. 

Socialism will rid us of the officious and bu- 
reaucratic officials whom we already have. 



THE GOOD MAN FALLACY 

No the good man theory will not hold water. 

There are some men who have broken away 
from the old party ties, but who have fallen into 
the equally great fallacy of picking out the good 
men from all tickets and voting for them. 

It no doubt seems to them to be reasonable to 
single out the good men and vote for them. 



128 what's so and what isn't 

But it is altogether unreasonable and unwise. 
It will not bear the test of logical examination. 

When correct principles have been adopted, and 
the elections therefore do not involve any ques- 
tion of principle, but merely involve the selection 
of the fittest persons to fill the various positions, 
the good man theory will become logical. But, so 
long as there are great principles involved in the 
elections, the good man theory is entirely illogi- 
cal. 

Every ticket stands for something. 

The republican and democratic tickets, for ex- 
ample, stand for the dominance of the capitalist 
class. Every man on those tickets is pledged to 
principles which result in the dominance of the 
capitalist class. 

No matter how good a candidate may be, he is 
bound by the principles of his party. He is 
bound, if elected, to do all in his power to carry 
out those principles. 

It therefore becomes of supreme importance to 
ask, not whether a candidate is a good man, but 
whether he stands for right principles. 

No matter if he is as good as an angel, if he 
stands for wrong principles it is foolish to vote 
for him. 

If you are against the principles of the repub- 
lican party, it is suicidal for you to vote for a 
republican just because he happens to be a good 
man. If you are against the principles of the 
democratic party, it is suicidal for you to vote for 
a democrat just because he happens to be a good 
man. It is suicidal in a minor election the same 
as a general election, for, every minor official 
elected is a material aid to his party in gaining 



THE GOOD MAN FALLACY 129 

and maintaining control of state and national af- 
fairs. 

The thing to do is to decide what party repre- 
sents your views, and then vote that party's ticket 
straight. If it is the Socialist party, vote the So- 
cialist ticket straight, without minutely examin- 
ing the moral character of the candidates. If it 
is the republican party, vote the republican ticket 
straight, without minutely examining the moral 
character of the candidates. If it is the demo- 
cratic party, vote the democratic ticket straight, 
without minutely examining the moral character 
of the candidates. 

In any case, in any party, you may be sure 
that the character of the candidates will lit well 
with the principles they stand for, and that, if 
elected, most of them will be true to tb a essential 
principles of their party. 

Even if a candidate is dishonest, you can in 
nearly every case trust him to be true to the es- 
sential principles of his party. To be false to 
those principles usually means political death to 
him. It is to his interest to be true to them. 

For example, no matter how honest or dishon- 
est a republican candidate may be, you can usually 
trust him to uphold the essential republican prin- 
csiples ; that is, to vote for the interest of the capi- 
talist class. 

And, no matter how honest or dishonest a dem- 
ocratic candidate may be, you can usually trust 
him tb be true to the essential democratic princi- 
ples ; that is, to vote for the interest of the capi- 
talist class. 

The great question, therefore, is, not whether 



130 what's so and what isn't 

a candidate is honest or dishonest, but whether he 
is the candidate of a party that stands for right 
principles. 

The Socialist party always nominates good 
men. 

But, it does not ask anybody to vote for its 
candidates because they are good men. 

It does ask every voter to vote for them be- 
cause the Socialist party stands for right princi- 
ples. 

Political parties may some time become a thing 
of the past. I believe they will. 

But, at the present time, they are decidedly a 
thing of the present. At the present time, they 
are absolutely necessary in order to gain a politi- 
cal end. 

The man, therefore, who does not ally himself 
, with any party, is a political exile. He is a vol- 
untary exile. He poses as an independent voter, 
and takes great credit to himself on that account. 
But, as a matter of fact, he deserves censure, in- 
stead of praise, for being a so-called independent 
voter at this stage of human progress when po- 
litical parties are altogether necessary in order to 
gain the adoption of principles. 

When he fails to line up with any party, he 
throws himself open to the suspicion that he 
hasn't any principles. If he has any principles, 
why doesn't he ally himself with the party which 
most nearly stands for them? 

As long as he is a so-called independent voter, 
pottering around voting for candidates of all par- 
ties because they are good men, he is a political 
nonentity. 

He votes for one principle in one column of the 



PATRIOTISM 131 

ballot, and then goes over in another column and 
nullifies the vote. 

He throws away his vote. 

He also throws away his vote if he votes a 
citizens' ticket, or an independent ticket, or a 
union labor ticket. Such tickets are mere flashes. 
They have no permanence. There is no stability 
to them. Even when they stand for good prin- 
ciples, it is throwing away one's vote to vote for 
them. They may win one minor election, or even 
two minor elections. But, having no general or- 
ganizations, they are doomed sooner or later to be 
annihilated by some party that has a general or- 
ganization. They are temporary. They are 
flashes in the pan. They are bog lights. They 
are will o' the wisps. 

The thing to do is to tie to a party that stands 
for something in national and international af- 
fairs. 

Then, when you win, even in a minor election, 
you have made a step toward the realization of 
your principles. 

And if you do not win, you have also made a 
step toward the realization of your principles, be- 
cause you have strengthened and built up the 
party that stands for them and proposes to carry 
them out. 



PATRIOTISM 



No, Socialism is not unpatriotic. 

Capitalism is unpatriotic. 

Capitalism stands for everything that tends to 



132 what's so and what isn't 

degrade, debauch and destroy the nation and the 
people. 

Socialism stands for everything that tends to 
purify and uplift them. 

The republican and democratic parties, both of 
which stand for the continuation of capitalism, 
pretend to be very patriotic. 

Samuel Johnson said that patriotism is the last 
resort of a scoundrel. Of course he meant that 
false or pretended patriotism is the last resort of 
a scoundrel ; or, in other words, that a scoundrel 
endeavors to hide his crimes and his criminal in- 
tentions and ingratiate himself in the hearts of 
the people by pretending to be patriotic. That 
false, pretended patriotism is the kind of patriot- 
ism the republican and democratic parties have. 

Their patriotism is pure buncombe. 

It is pure pretense. 

They do not have one spark of love for just 
principles of government. On the contrary, their 
entire purpose is to perpetuate injustice. 

The only true patriotism there is in America is 
in the Socialist party. 

Some people think the Socialists are unpa- 
triotic because they unsparingly criticise the evils 
of the day. But, he is the best patriot who boldly 
confronts the evils, lays them bare, and proceeds 
to remedy them, as the Socialists do. Others 
think the Socialists are unpatriotic because they 
talk about revolution. But these same people can 
talk glibly about the revolution of 1776, without 
a thought of disapproval. Some of our fair la- 
dies whose ancestors took part in that revolution 
have an organization whose name is Daughters 
of the American Revolution. 



PATRIOTISM 133 

That doesn't scare anybody, does it ? 

Then, why should anybody get scared when a 
Socialist speaks of the revolution that is about to 
come? 

Perhaps it is because people think we mean a 
bloody revolution. 

But, the revolution the Socialists are working 
for is a peaceful revolution at the ballot box — a 
revolution from the private ownership of the in- 
dustries for the benefit of a few to the public 
ownership of the industries for the benefit of all. 
We propose to do everything within reason to 
make this revolution peaceful. If it should be 
bloody, it will not be our fault. 

Then others think the Socialists are unpatriotic 
because they sometimes carry a red flag. 

But, these people do not know the significance 
of the red flag. They think it means bloodshed 
and anarchy. 

The red flag signifies that all men are brothers. 
It so happens that, although men are very differ- 
ent in many other respects, they all have red 
blood in their veins. Red blood is common to 
them all. So, the red flag is the banner of brother- 
hood. It is the international banner of the work- 
ing class. It has been the banner of the working 
class for thousands of years. In the struggle for 
liberty, myriads of heroic workingmen have 
fought and died beneath its folds. Is it any won- 
der we love it? 

Old Glory is a national banner. I do not know 
ot any valid reason why a Socialist should not 
appreciate those who fought the battles of their 
own generations, the battles which had to be 
fought in the course of the evolution of the race 



134: what's so and what isn't 

toward Socialism. For my part, I do appreciate 
them, and I love the banner they fought under, 
the stars and stripes. 

Capitalism is trailing the flag in the dust. 

Socialism will rescue it. 

Capitalism makes the stars and stripes stand for 
everything that is brutal, infamous and unjust. 

Socialism will make the stars and stripes stand 
for everything that is just, noble and uplifting. 

So, even in the old sense of the term patriot- 
ism, the Socialists are the only true patriots. 

The old idea is that patriotism is love of coun- 
try. 

But that is only a portion of the truth. 

True patriotism is love of the whole world, 
love of the whole human race. 

A man whose patriotism stops with the boun- 
daries of his own country is only an embryo pa- 
triot. He is undeveloped. 

And a man who cherishes a feeling of hostility 
toward other countries is a jingo pervert. 

National boundary lines are arbitrary. It is 
necessary that they should exist because the 
world is too big to be one nation. 

Some day — and it is not far distant either — 
Tennyson's dream of a federation of the world 
will come true. But, national boundary lines will 
no doubt still exist. They will exist for the rea- 
son that they are of practical convenience and ne- 
cessity in carrying on the affairs of the world. 
That is the only valid reason there has ever 
been for their existence. They should be regard- 
ed, not as fortifications that separate us from the 
foe, but merely as lines drawn for convenience, 



PATRIOTISM 135 

to show where our field of labor leaves off and 
where our brothers' fields begin. 

The Socialist party is imbued with this new, 
this broad patriotism. 

The Socialist party believes that all men are 
brothers and that all the world is kin. It knows 
that the reason men are divided into warring 
classes is because under the present capitalist sys- 
tem they have hostile economic interests. It 
stands for the natural and only method of ending 
the class struggle and bringing about conditions 
wherein men can live up to their kinship. 

The Socialist party has chosen for its emblem 
a globe with clasped hands across it. It knows 
that the sole reason why the nations of the world 
bristle up and snarl at each other is because of 
the present economic arrangements. And it 
knows that the interests of the great majority of 
human beings demand such changes in the eco- 
nomic arrangements as will make it no longer 
necessary for the nations to bristle up and snarl 
at each other. 

The Socialists are against war. 

I do not mean by this that we would refuse to 
fight, under any and all circumstances. I do not 
mean that we are apostles of the doctrine of non- 
resistance. I do not mean that we would stand 
still and let ourselves be slaughtered. I do not 
mean that we would refrain from taking up arms 
and waging aggressive warfare in a just cause. 

Far from it. 

If the cause of human freedom demanded it, 
we would shoulder our guns and get in line. 

But we are in favor of peace, just the same. 



136 what's so and what isn't 

And we are in favor of the only economic meas- 
ures that can insure peace. 

The time has gone by when the nations want 
to fight each other just for the fun of the thing, 
just because they are of warlike disposition. 
Every war nowadays has some cause different 
from that. And, in every instance, that cause is 
rooted in the present economic system. 

Under the present capitalist system of indus- 
try, the industries in each nation are owned by a 
few capitalists. They hire wage slaves to do the 
work. Labor saving machinery has made the 
productivity of these wage slaves enormous. The 
capitalists pay them as wages just enough for 
them barely to live on and raise children. As 
this is only a fraction of the value of their labor, 
it naturally follows that they are only able to buy 
back a fraction of their product. They could con- 
sume it all if they could get it, but they can't get 
it because their incomes are too small to buy it. 
The capitalists and their retainers are unable to 
consume all the balance. Consequently, there is a 
great surplus that has to seek a market abroad. 

Every civilized nation is in this condition. 
Every civilized nation is therefore constantly on 
the lookout to preserve its markets abroad, and to 
secure new ones if possible, and also to gain or 
retain opportunities for the investment of surplus 
capital. 

Right there lies the cause of all modern wars. 

Right there lay the cause of the Spanish-Cuban 
war. 

Right there lay the cause of the Spanish-Amer- 
ican war. 



PATRIOTISM 13 7 

Right there lay the cause of the Philippine war. 

Right there lay the cause of the Boxer trouble 
in China. 

Right there lay the cause of the Boer war. 

Right there lay the cause of the Russo-Japanese 
war. 

Every one of these wars was fought for the 
purpose of either gaining or retaining foreign or 
colonial markets and gaining or retaining oppor- 
tunities for the investment of surplus capital. 

For identically the same reason, all the nations 
of the world are at swords' points. They are all 
maintaining immense navies for the sole and only 
purpose of gaining and retaining foreign and co- 
lonial markets and gaining and retaining opportu- 
nities for the investment of surplus capital. 

Right there also lies the secret of imperialism. 

Imperialism is a necessary and inevitable out- 
come of capitalism. So long as capitalism, with 
its wholesale robbery of the working class, con- 
tinues, the nations must seek an outlet for the 
stolen goods, the surplus product, and for the sur- 
plus capital. Therefore they must be imperial- 
istic. Any man who opposes imperialism and at 
the same time upholds the capitalist system is 
short-sighted and illogical. He can not logically 
oppose imperialism unless he at the same time op- 
poses capitalism and advocates Socialism. For 
Socialism is the only cure for imperialism. 

And Socialism is the only cure for war. 

Socialism will put an end to war and imperial- 
ism because it will put an end to the fierce contest 
for foreign markets and foreign investments. 

When Socialism is introduced, the men and 
women who do the necessary and useful mental 



138 what's so and what isn't 

and manual work of the world will receive the 
full product. They will consume it themselves. 
If they are not able to consume it all, they will 
shorten their hours of labor and not produce so 
much. As a matter of course they will exchange 
products with foreign nations, each nation getting 
those things which it desires. But they will not 
have any occasion at all to engage in a scramble 
for foreign markets. And, as for foreign invest- 
ments, they will not be in the investing business. 

Therefore, when all nations are socialized, the 
cause of war will be gone. 

The navies can be placed in the Socialist mu- 
seum. 

Some people have been inclined to scoff at us 
Socialists because of our opposition to war. They 
have contemptuously declared that our expecta- 
tion of bringing war to an end is Utopian. 

But, when the cause of war is once realized, it 
is easy to see that Socialism will remove that 
cause, and that, therefore, the end of war is a 
certainty instead of an idle dream. 

The Socialists have already made their influ- 
ence felt in preventing war. 

When Germany and France were spatting over 
Morocco, in 1905, the German and French Social- 
ists were unanimously of the opinion that the 
German and French workingmen had no quarrel 
with each other and that it would be folly for 
them to help their masters, the capitalists, to fight 
with each other over foreign markets and foreign 
investments. Without a doubt, their opposition 
to war had a great deal of influence in causing 
the two nations to settle the question peaceably. 

It is useless for the capitalists to enter into a 



PATRIOTISM 139 

war, unless they can foment hatred among the 
people, so that they will go forth and fight the 
battles, while the capitalists themselves keep at a 
safe distance. 

The capitalists may not be invincible in peace, 
but they are certainly invisible in war. 

All modern wars are fought for their benefit, 
but they let their dupes, the workingmen, do the 
fighting. 

When the workingmen are not foolish enough 
to consent to do the fighting, the war has to be 
called off. 

When Norway declared herself independent of 
Sweden, the capitalists of Sweden wanted to 
force her back into the alliance, because the two 
nations combined could exercise more power and 
influence in foreign affairs ; that is, in the gain- 
ing and retaining of foreign markets and oppor- 
tunities for investment. But the Socialists of 
Sweden declared that they would refuse to fight 
against the workingmen of Norway. And, as 
nearly all the workingmen of Sweden are So- 
cialists, the capitalists were compelled to abandon 
the war project. 

So, the Socialists have already prevented war to 
some extent. 

As fast as the Socialists become more numer- 
ous, war will become less frequent. 

And when the Socialists gain control of all the 
nations, war will cease altogether. 

The Socialists are imbued with the wider pa- 
triotism. They know that the interests of the 
workingmen of all civilized countries are identi- 
cal, and not antagonistic. 

They believe in the federation of the world. 



110 what's so and what isn t 

Some day, as August Bebel says, there will be 
a world parliament, formed of representatives of 
all the civilized nations, which will regulate in- 
ternational relations and render them more and 
more stable. 



THE RACE PROBLEM 

What are we Socialists going to do with the 
negro ? 

We are going to give him justice along with 
the rest. 

The prejudice against the negro is by no means 
confined to the South. It is just as strong in the 
North as it is in the South. The only reason it 
does not show itself as much in the North is be- 
cause the negroes are fewer in number. 

I do not mean that everybody is prejudiced 
against the negro. There are exceptions. 

The blacks are prejudiced against the whites as 
much as the whites against the blacks. And they 
certainly have good reason to be. 

This prejudice between the races is fostered and 
increased by economic friction. The negro nat- 
urally hates the whites because they quietly and 
persistently keep him down. A white man hates 
a negro who competes with him in business. 
Under the present system, the higher education 
of the negro aggravates this condition. A white 
workingman hates a negro who competes with 
him for a job. Under the present system, the in- 
dustrial education of the negro aggravates this 
condition. Negroes are sometimes used by the 
capitalists as strike breakers. This of course ag- 



THE RACE PROBLEM 141 

gravates race prejudice to the point of inflamma- 
tion. When a negro victim of manifold economic 
injustice assaults a white woman, this again fans 
race prejudice into a flame. 

This race prejudice in deplorable. It is a badge 
of mediocrity. It shows that, in spite of our mar- 
velous advancement, we are not developed as far 
from the beast as we might be. To a highly de- 
veloped person, race prejudice is a stranger. In 
a condition of universal enlightenment, race prej- 
udice could not exist. 

Nevertheless, this race prejudice is a fact. And 
facts must always be taken into account. 

The whites brought the negroes here, for econ- 
nomic reasons. The negroes came against their 
will. The whites should never forget that fact. 

However, neither the present generation of 
whites nor the present generation of blacks is to 
blame for the existence of the race problem. 

We are all here. 

Let's solve the problem in a way that will do 
justice to us all. 

The negro is entitled to be guaranteed an op- 
portunity to earn a living, the same as a white 
man. He is entitled to the full value of his labor, 
the same as a white man. He is entitled to a vote 
in the government to which he is compelled to 
submit, the same as a white man. 

Socialism will guarantee him the exercise of 
these rights. Socialism will therefore open up to 
him the avenues to all the higher things of life 
and give him a chance to develop himself. So- 
cialism will remove the economic friction between 
the races. 

As for the bugaboo of social intercourse, I have 



142 what's so and what isn't 

shown in fhe chapter on Communism that So- 
cialism will release you from having to associate 
with the white people who are disagreeable to 
you, but with whom you are now compelled to as- 
sociate. In the same manner, Socialism will re- 
lease you from having to associate with black 
people if they are disagreeable to you. It will 
also release the negroes from having to associate 
with white people. 

All the Socialist party proposes to do with the 
negro is to give him economic justice. Social 
gravitation will do the rest. 

Under present conditions the negroes and the 
whites are compelled to live in the same localities 
because the negroes work for the whites. 

Under Socialism, it will be entirely feasible for 
the negroes to live in localities by themselves, if 
they so desire, and run the public industries of 
those localities. Since the negroes as a rule do 
not like to associate with the whites, but prefer 
the company of their own people, it is probable 
that when Socialism makes their voluntary segre- 
gation possible, they will take advantage of it, 
thus gaining the opportunity to work out their 
own development, which was so rudely wrenched 
from its natural course by the slave trade of long 
ago. 

Undoubtedly, when the whites no longer need 
the negroes about them for economic reasons, 
many of the whites will also be in favor of the 
segregation of the races, and will assist .the ten- 
dency in that direction by that quiet but powerful 
urge which they have become past masters in ad- 
ministering. 

If segregation takes place, it should take place 



A BIG UNDERTAKING 143 

by natural gravitation, not by statute law. We 
have had quite enough attempts to solve the race 
problem by force. 

Of one thing we may be certain. Whether 
segregation takes place or not, the highly cul- 
tured men and women of the two races will in- 
sist upon perfect freedom of association with each 
other. They will not be willing to forego the ben- 
efits and pleasures of intellectual intercourse, in 
deference to an unworthy prejudice. 

The white race can well .afford to do justice to 
the black race. It might afford to do more than 
justice. It certainly can not afford to do less. 

The removal of economic friction between the 
races, and the higher development of both whites 
and blacks, will cause race prejudice to gradually 
fade away and finally disappear. 



A BIG UNDERTAKING 

But Socialism is a mighty big undertaking. 

Of course it is a big undertaking. 

What of it? 

The American people are not in the habit of 
backing down before a big undertaking. 

If the public can manage the United States 
army for warlike purposes, it can manage its col- 
lective self in peaceful pursuits. 

If it can manage the United States navy, it can 
manage the ocean passenger and freight business. 

If it can operate the postoffice, it can operate 
the telegraph, telephone, express and railroad 
lines. 



144 what's so and what isn t 

If it can make warships, it can make automo- 
biles and self-binders. 

If it can make rifles, it can make knives and 
forks. 

If it can make army saddles, it can make boots 
and shoes. 

If it can manage experimental farms like those 
at the agricultural colleges, it can manage more 
extensive agricultural industries. 

If it can run an army and navy hospital, it can 
run a drug store. 

If it can irrigate land, it can dig coal. 

If it can build bridges, it can build factories. 

If it can sell stamps, it can sell groceries. 

If it can supply the people with water and gas, 
it can run a laundry. 

If it can supply food for an army and a navy, it 
can run a hotel and a restaurant. 

If it can run a state university, it can run a 
packing house. 

If it can manage an insane asylum, it can man- 
age an oil refinery. 

If it can run a fire department, it can manu- 
facture wagons, ladders and hose. 

If it can pave streets, it can make brick and as- 
phalt. 

If it can run the public schools, it can run the 
street cars. 

A big undertaking? 

So was the establishment of the American re- 
public a big undertaking. But it was accom- 
plished just the same. 

A big undertaking ? 

So was the emancipation of the chattel slaves a 
big undertaking. But when the American people 



THE CONSTITUTION 145 

were thoroughly convinced that it ought to be 
done they arose in their might and did it. 

And when the American people are thoroughly 
convinced that the Socialist commonwealth ought 
to be established, no matter how big an undertak- 
ing it may be, they will get down to businsess and 
establish it. 

The occasion always produces the men and the 
means to cope with it. 

When the time was ripe for the American re- 
public to be born, George Washington and Ben- 
jamin Franklin and the rest of the revolutionary 
heroes reported for duty, and the means of accom- 
plishing the desired end were discovered and ap- 
plied. 

When the time was ripe for the emancipation of 
the chattel slaves, Abraham Lincoln and his fel- 
low heroes were on the spot, and the means of ac- 
complishing the result were evolved and the pro- 
ject carried out. 

And when the American people become con- 
vinced of the fact that the time is now ripe for the 
establishment of Socialism, the men of mature 
wisdom and sound deliberate judgment will be 
available, and the means whereby the desired re- 
sult is to be attained will not be lacking. 



THE CONSTITUTION 

No, we shall not have to violate the constitution 
of the United States in order to introduce Social- 
ism. 

^ But if we did we would only be following a 
time-honored custom. 



146 what's so and what isn't 

Every time a political party meets in national 
convention and nominates candidates for presi- 
dent and vice president, it violates the spirit of the 
constitution. 

Every time a judge sends a man to jail, or fines 
him, for contempt of court, he violates the consti- 
tution, which says in so many words that the trial 
of all crimes, except in cases of impeachment, 
shall be by jury. 

The democratic party is making a continuous 
violation of the constitution by depriving the 
Southern negroes of the ballot. 

The republican party is making a continuous 
violation of the constitution by failing to cut down 
the number of congressmen from those Southern 
states which have disfranchised the negroes. 

So you see the republicans and democrats do 
not hesitate to violate the constitution persistently 
whenever it suits their purpose to do so. 

Therefore, they could not consistently object if 
we did it. 

But we do not intend to do it. 

Well, them shall we not have to pass a series of 
constitutional amendments ? 

No, not in order to introduce Socialism. We 
may need to do so in order to change specific pro- 
visions of the constitution. 

It would require a separate pamphlet to treat 
this question in detail. I will only give an out- 
line of the situation. 

The constitution gives Congress the power to 
provide for the general welfare of the United 
States. Socialism is for the general welfare of 
the United States. Therefore, Congress can pass 



THE CONSTITUTION 147 

the necessary laws for the introduction of Social- 
ism without any constituional amendment. 

A controversy about the meaning of the general 
welfare clause began immediately after the con- 
stitutional convention of 1787 adjourned. The 
supreme court decided that it did not mean what 
it said, but w r as a subordinate, explanatory clause. 
Under that decision, Congress could not pass laws 
introducing Socialism. But that decision is alto- 
gether erroneous. Congress can, therefore, pass 
the necessary laws in spite of it. 

But will not the supreme court declare those 
laws unconstitutional ? 

The supreme court has no power to declare a 
law unconstitutional. 

It is tyranny for nine men to overrule the will 
of the people of the United States. 

It is an insult to the framers of the constitution 
to charge them with having given the supreme 
court any such arbitrary power. 

They did not do it. 

The constitution does not say it. 

The supreme court usurped that power, and, 
like so many other usurpations and encroach- 
ments, it has simply been acquiesced in. 

Therefore, if the supreme court declares a law 
passed by the Socialist congress unconstitutional, 
the Socialist congress can simply declare that it is 
constitutional and go ahead and carry it into ef- 
fect. 

Of course, Congress could enlarge the supreme 
court, fill it with Socialist justices, and then get 
the right decision. But the supreme court, or any 
other court, whether capitalist or Socialist, has 
no right to declare a law unconstitutional. 



148 what's so and what isn't 

So, we can introduce Socialism without a con- 
stitutional amendment. 

But suppose we should want to change some 
specific clause in the constitution. Suppose, for 
example, that we wanted to abolish the United 
States senate. 

That would require a constitutional amend- 
ment. 

Should we have to get a two-thirds vote of both 
houses of Congress and a majority vote of the 
legislatures or special conventions of three- 
fourths of the states, as provided by the constitu- 
tion, before we could pass that amendment ? 

Not necessarily. 

Why? 

Because that provision in the constitution, re- 
quiring practically a three-fourths vote in order 
to amend it, is null and void. 

Much as we may admire our forefathers, they 
had not he slightest right or power to bind us 
by a provision which is flatly against majority 
rule. 

We are not under the slightest obligation to 
obey that provision. 

Any provision that is opposed to the principle 
of majority rule is against public policy. 

Any provision that is opposed to the principle 
of majority rule is null and void. 

We should proceed just as if it did not exist. 

We can amend the constitution by a majority 
vote. 



INEVITABILITY OF SOCIALISM l-±9 



INEVITABILITY OF SOCIALISM 

Why do we insist that Socialism is inevitable ? 

Because Socialism is not an arbitrary plan, 
scheme or invention, but is the logical and natural 
goal of economic evolution. 

Then, why do we insist upon working for it 
with such ceaseless activity and indomitable en- 
ergy ? 

Because it can be hastened by its friends and 
delayed by its enemies. And because in saving 
that it is inevitable we take into account, not only 
economic evolution, but also the well known 
qualities of human nature. It would not be in- 
evitable if it were not a certainty that human be- 
ings will work for it as soon as they realize that 
it is to their interest to do so. It can not intro- 
duce itself, without the aid of human beings. We 
must enlighten people about it. We must also 
guide its course safely away from republican and 
democratic pitfalls, and set our political house in 
order for its reception. 

Socialism is the next step in the evolution of 
the human race. For centuries, we have been 
getting ready to take that step, and the time is 
just now ripe for the taking of the step. 

Time was when the tools in all industries were 
simple and inexpensive. Each worker was able 
to accomplish this task without the assistance of 
others. It was natural that under such circum- 
stances each worker should own his own tools. 

But tools have developed into marvelous labor 
saving machines. The worker is not able to own 
the machinery. And he is no longer able to turn 



150 what's so and what isn't 

out his product without assistance. He has to 
co-operate with many others in producing. The 
development of labor saving machinery made this 
a necessity. The workers have to work together. 
It is therefore natural that they should now own 
the industries together. 

Time was when each worker produced his own 
food, built his own house, and made his own 
clothes. He was practically independent of his 
fellow men. Private ownership was natural at 
that time. 

But the industrial development from the hand 
tool to the labor saving machine, from small in- 
dustry to great industry, has made such a life im- 
possible. It has specialized the industries. It is 
no longer possible for us to get along without our 
fellow men. Industrial development has made us 
all mutually interdependent. It is to our inter- 
est to co-operate with each other. It is therefore 
natural that the people should now own the indus- 
tries together. 

The wage worker works part of the day for his 
wages and the rest of the day for nothing. It is 
a certainty that so long as the present capitalist 
system exists, the workers, by their labor, will 
enrich the few owners of the industries, instead 
of getting the benefit of their labor themselves. 
In order to get the benefit of their labor them- 
selves, they must have the public ownership and 
the popular management of the industries which 
are now used for the purpose of robbing them. 

The capitalists set the price of what the farmer 
sells. They also set the price of what the farmer 
buys. They pluck him in both operations, and 
thus lift the bulk of the value of his product right 



THE INEVITABILITY OF SOCIALISM 151 

out of his hands and put it into their own pock- 
ets. In order to get the benefit of their labor 
themselves, the farmers also must have the public 
ownership and the popular management of those 
industries which are used for the purpose of rob- 
bing the workers. 

So, Socialism becomes the logical, the natural 
and the necessary result of the evolution of the 
hand tool into the labor saving machine and the 
development of small industry into great indus- 
try. The development of the industries into trusts 
and combines has ripened them for public owner- 
ship. 

There is simply no other way for the people to 
come into their own. 

The present capitalist system, by its own inher- 
ent nature, must infallibly work its own down- 
fall. 

Capitalism, like an ill-starred victim of an in- 
curable disease, carries within itself the germ that 
dooms it to death. 

Practically every move made by the capitalist 
class hastens the doom of capitalism. When they 
settle labor troubles by raising wages, they whet 
the appetite of the workingman for the full value 
of their labor, which they can only get through the 
Socialist ballot. When they settle labor troubles 
by lowering wages, they convince the working- 
men that the Socialist ballot is their only hope. 
When they increase productivity, by the introduc- 
tion of new machinery, or by the further central- 
ization of industry into trusts and combines, they 
hasten the day of chronic overproduction, or 
under-consumption, when the people will be 
forced to introduce Socialism or starve to death. 



152 what's so and what isn't 

It is the very nature and essence of capitalism 
to concentrate wealth into the hands of a few. 
The more wealth a man acquires, the more he is 
able to squeeze out of other men. 

When modern industry began to develop, the 
men who secured possession of the industries be- 
came wealthy. At that time they were consid- 
ered wealthy if they were worth only a few thous- 
and dollars. As time went on, they crowded their 
competitors out of business wherever possible and 
kept on increasing their wealth by pocketing the 
proceeds of other men's toil, until, in awestruck 
whispers, men began to be pointed out whose for- 
tunes ran up into the hundreds of thousands. 

Then came millionaires. 

Then multi-millionaires. 

Then men worth a hundred million. 

And two hundred million. 

And three hundred million. 

And, now, there are three or four men in 
America who are probably billionaires. 

This process has been one of infinite tragedy. 

One by one, the smaller businesses have been 
ruined by the big concerns. 

Dun and Bradstreet report from a hundred and 
fifty to three hundred business failures every week 
with the regularity of clockwork. 

This long and excruciating tragedy has hurled 
millions of small business men into the ranks of 
the working class, and shattered the opportuni- 
ties of the rest of them under this system. 

On page fifty-three of the Statistical Atlas of 
the United States, which is a part of the 1900 Cen- 
sus Report, prepared by the enemies of Socialism 
and published by the government, it is stated that 



FORWARD 153 

eighty per cent of the male, gainfully occupied 
population of the United States consists of wage 
earners. 

The development of capitalism has therefore 
constantly decreased the number of men whose 
interests demand the retention of capitalism. And 
it has just as constantly increased the number of 
men whose interests demand the destruction of 
capitalism and the introduction of Socialism. So, 
at the present time, the men whose interests de- 
mand the destruction of capitalism and the intro- 
duction of Socialism are in the overwhelming 
majority. The only reason they have not already 
destroyed capitalism and introduced Socialism is 
because they have not understood the situation. 
Nothing enslaves but ignorance. But the igno- 
rance is fast being dispelled. 

So, I say that capitalism carries within itself 
the germ that dooms it to death. 

Its overthrow, and the consequent introduction 
of Socialism, is just as inevitable as the relentless 
march of time. 

But it can be hastened, and it can be delayed. 

See that you hasten it. 



FORWARD 



I am bold enough to believe that any honest in- 
vestigator will agree with me that capitalism is a 
mere temporary make-shift, and that Socialism is 
to be its natural, necessary and inevitable suc- 
cessor. 

If I am correct in this diagnosis of the state of 



154 what's so and what isn't 

your mind I have one more very important word 
to say to you by way of conclusion. 

Read the fundamental Socialist works and take 
an active part in the Socialist party organization. 

It is of supreme importance that every Socialist 
should be thoroughly grounded in the funda- 
mental principles of scientific Socialism. 

It is likewise of supreme importance that every 
Socialist should co-operate with every other So- 
cialist by aggressive activity in the Socialist party 
organization. 

The Socialist party has started upon its career 
with a full knowledge of its high mission. The 
time has come in the history of the world for con- 
scious evolution. We Socialists know full well 
that the economic laws compel the abolition of 
capitalism and the introduction of Socialism. And 
we have deliberately organized the Socialist party 
in order to make the transition from capitalism 
to Socialism as smooth and easy and rapid as pos- 
sible. 

In order to do this successfully it is necessary 
for us to remove economic bewilderment from the 
minds of the people and put the clear, simple truth 
in its place. It is necessary for us to send speak- 
ers to every corner of the land. It is necessary 
for us to put Socialist literature in the hand of 
every adult in America. And it is necessary _ to 
keep on doing this until the object is accom- 
plished. 

To do this requires an aggressive and system- 
atic organization, ramifying into every locality in 
the country. 

The importance of systematic and effective or- 
ganization can not be overestimated. 



FORWARD 155 

It was the effort put forth by the organized So- 
cialists of America that brought us our splendid 
victory in the presidential election. 

Remember that. 

Organization is the key to success. 

Remember that. 

Turn it over and over in your mind. 

Let it filter into your blood. 

The capitalist class has no fear of a million un- 
organized Socialists. 

It is the organized Socialist party with its bat- 
teries that never sleep, that gives them the cold 
shivers. The calm confidence of the organized 
Socialist party is the most terrific fact the capi- 
talists ever encountered. 

The Socialist party is a rank and file party. 
Every act of every officer is subject to referendum 
vote of the membership. Every officer is also 
subject to recall by vote of the membership. 

The Socialist party never slumbers, never 
sleeps. It carries on an incessant agitaion be- 
tween campaigns as well as during campaigns. 

It intends that Socialism shall be speedily real- 
ized. 

Anyone at all acquainted with the industrial sit- 
uation, and with the temper of the magnificent 
army of Socialists of this and other lands will 
look upon this as a positive certainty. 

In the Socialist the zeal of the crusader is com- 
bined with political common sense — a combination 
which must win. 

The Socialist is not a quitter. 

He is here to stay. 

The future is his. 

He is the man of destiny. 

He is practical. 



156 what's so and what isn't 

He is the only man who has interpreted the 
spirit of the age. 

He is the only man who has read the signs of 
the times. 

He is the only man who has discovered the 
shadows which coming events are casting before 
them. 

He proclaims the truth. 

He is, therefore, invulnerable. 

He draws his shining lance and challenges 
every other school of economic thought in the 
world to meet him in the arena of debate. 

And they slink away like whipped curs, con- 
scious that they are in the wrong. 

Socialism is the next step in the evolution of 
humanity. 

The world is being urged toward it with 
winged speed by the action of irresistible eco- 
nomic laws. 

The fingers of all past ages point forward to it. 

In a world of trouble, sorrow, poverty, igno- 
rance and anguish, Socialism is the only hope. 

Without it, all is gloom, the times are out of 
joint, and the world has gone crazy. 

With it, the world is sane, and the future is 
bright with better things. 



OCf 22 1906 




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